Source Description:Reminiscences of the Civil War
Gordon, John B.
New YorkCharles Scribner's Sons
Atlanta
The Martin & Hoyt Co.
1904

The electronic edition is a part of the UNC-CH
digitization project, Documenting the American South, Beginnings to 1920.
Any hyphens occurring in line breaks have been
removed, and the trailing part of a word has been joined to
the preceding line.
All quotation marks and ampersand have been transcribed as
entity references.
All double right and left quotation marks are encoded as "
and "
respectively.
All single right and left quotation marks are encoded as '
and ' respectively.
Indentation in lines has not been preserved.
Running titles have not been preserved.
Spell-check and verification made against printed text
using Author/Editor (SoftQuad) and Microsoft Word spell check programs.

NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
ATLANTA
THE MARTIN & HOYT CO.
1904

Copyright, 1903. by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONSPublished October, 1903

CONTENTS

I MY FIRST COMMAND AND THE OUTBREAK OF THE WAR
A company of mountaineers--Joe Brown's pikes--The Raccoon
Roughs--The first Rebel yell--A flag presented to the company--
Arrival at Montgomery, Alabama--Analysis of the causes of the war--
Slavery's part in it--Liberty in the Union of the States, and liberty in
the independence of the States . . . . . 3

II THE TRIP FROM CORINTH
The Raccoon Roughs made a part of the Sixth Alabama--The journey to
Virginia--Families divided in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri--A
father captured by a son in battle--The military spirit in
Virginia--Andrew Johnson and Parson Brownlow Union leaders
in Tennessee--Johnson's
narrowness afterward exhibited as President . . . . . 26

III BULL RUN OR MANASSAS
The first great battle of the war--A series of surprises--Mishaps
and mistakes of the Confederates--Beauregard's lost order--General
Ewell's rage--The most eccentric officer in the Confederate army--
Anecdotes of his career--The wild panic of the Union troops--Senseless
frights that cannot be explained--Illustrated at Cedar Creek . . . . . 37

IV THE SPRING OF 1862--BATTLE OF SEVEN PINES OR FAIR OAKS
Indomitable Americanism, North and South--Rally of the North
after Bull Run--Severity of winter quarters in Virginia--
McClellan's army landed at Yorktown--Retreat of the Confederates--
On the Chickahominy--Terrible slaughter at Seven Pines--A brigade
commander . . . . . 47

V PRESENTIMENTS AND FATALISM AMONG SOLDIERS
Wonderful instances of prophetic foresight--Colonel Lomax
predicts his death--The vision of a son dying two days before
Page vi

VII ANTIETAM
Restoration of McClellan to command of the Federals--My command
at General Lee's centre--Remarkable series of bayonet charges by the
Union troops--How the centre was held--Bravery of the Union
commander--A long struggle for life . . . . . 80

VIII CHANCELLORSVILLE
A long convalescence--Enlivened by the author of "Georgia
Scenes"--The movement upon Hooker's army at
Chancellorsville-- Remarkable interview between Lee
and Stonewall Jackson--The
secret of Jackson's character--The storming of Marye's
Heights--Some famous war-horses . . . . . 92

IX WAR BY THE BRAVE AGAINST THE BRAVE
The spirit of good-fellowship between Union and Confederate
soldiers-- Disappearance of personal hatred as the war progressed--The Union
officer who attended a Confederate dance--American chivalry at
Vicksburg--Trading between pickets on the Rappahannock--Incidents
of the bravery of color-bearers on both sides--General Curtis's
kindness-- A dash for life cheered by the enemy . . . . . 105

X RETROSPECTIVE VIEW OF LEADERS AND EVENTS
Confederate victories up to the winter of 1863--Southern
confidence in ultimate independence--Progress of Union armies in
the West--Fight for the control of the Mississippi--General Butler
in possession of New Orleans--The new era in naval
construction--Significance of the battle of the Monitor and Merrimac--Great
leaders who had come into prominence in both armies--The death of
Albert Sidney Johnston--General Lee the most unassuming of great
Commanders . . . . . 120

XI GETTYSBURG
Why General Lee crossed the Potomac--The movement into
Pennsylvania--Incidents of the march to the Susquehanna--
Page vii

The first day at Gettysburg--Union forces driven back--The key of the
Position--Why the Confederates did not seize Cemetery Ridge--A
defence of General Lee's strategy--The fight at Little Round Top--The
immortal charge of Pickett's men--General Meade's
deliberate pursuit--Lee's request to be relieved . . . . . 137

XII VICKSBURG AND HELENA
The four most crowded and decisive days of the war--Vicksburg the
culmination of Confederate disaster--Frequent change of commanders in
the Trans-Mississippi Department--General Grant's tunnel at
Fort Hill--Courage of Pemberton's soldiers--Explosion
of the mine--Hand-to-hand
conflict--The surrender . . . . . 177

XIII FROM VICKSBURG AND GETTYSBURG TO CHICKAMAUGA
Lee's army again headed toward Washington--He decides not to cross
the Potomac at the opening of winter--Meade's
counter-attack--Capture of a redoubt on the
Rappahannock--A criticism of Secretary
Stanton--General Bragg's strategy--How Rosecrans compelled the
evacuation of Chattanooga . . . . . 188

XIV CHICKAMAUGA
One of the bloodiest battles of modern times--Comparison with
other great battles of the world--Movements of both armies before
the collision--A birds-eye view--The night after the battle--General
Thomas's brave stand--How the assault of Longstreet's wing was made--Both
sides claim a victory . . . . . 198

XV MISSIONARY RIDGE--TRIUNE DISASTER
Why General Bragg did not pursue Rosecrans after
Chickamauga--Comparison of the Confederates
at Missionary Ridge with the Greeks
at Marathon--The Battle above the Clouds--Heroic
advance by Walthall's Mississippians--General Grant's timely arrival with
reënforcements--The way opened to Atlanta . . . . . 213

XVI WINTER ON THE RAPIDAN
In camp near Clark's Mountain--Religious awakening--Revival
services throughout the camps--General Lee's interest in the
movement--Southern women at work--Extracts from General Lee's letters to his
wife--Influence of religion on the soldiers' character . . . . . 229

XVII THE WILDERNESS--BATTLE OF MAY 5
Beginning of the long fight between Grant and Lee--Grant
crosses the Rapidan--First contact of the two armies--Ewell's
Page viii

XVIII THE WILDERNESS--BATTLE OF MAY 6
The men ordered to sleep on their arms--Report of
scouts--Sedgwick's exposed position--A plan proposed to flank and crash
him--General Early's objections to it--Unfounded belief that Burnside
protected Sedgwick--General Lee orders a movement in the late
afternoon--Its success until interrupted by darkness--The
Government official records prove that Early was mistaken . . . . . 243

XIX RESULTS OF THE DRAWN BATTLES
General Grant the aggressor--Failure to dislodge Lee--An exciting
night ride--Surrounded by Federal troops--A narrow escape in the
darkness--General Lee's comments on the assault upon
Sedgwick--A remarkable prediction as to General Grant's next movement . . . . . 262

XX SPOTTSYLVANIA
General Lee's prophecy fulfilled--Hancock's assault on
May 12--One of his greatest Achievements--General Lee to the head of the
column--Turned back by his own men--Hancock repulsed--The
most remarkable battle of the war--Heroism on both sides . . . . . 271

XXI MOVEMENTS AFTER SPOTTSYLVANIA
A surprising capture--Kind treatment received by prisoners--Five
rainy days of inaction--Fighting resumed on May 18--Hancock's
corps ordered to the assault--General Grant's order to Meade:
"Where Lee goes, there you will go also"--How Lee turned the
tables--Fighting it out on this line all summer --Lee's men still
resolute after the Wilderness . . . . . 287

XXIII WINCHESTER AND PRECEDING EVENTS
The Confederate army within sight of Washington--The city could
have been taken--Reasons for the retreat--Abandonment of plan
to release Confederate prisoners--The Winchester
Page ix

XXIV CEDAR CREEK--A VICTORY AND A DEFEAT
Sheridan's dallying for twenty-six days--Arrival of General
Kershaw--Position of Early's army with reference to Sheridan's--The
outlook from Massanutten Mountain--Weakness of Sheridan's left
revealed--The plan of battle--A midnight march--Complete
surprise and rout of Sheridan's army--Early's decision not to follow
up the victory--Why Sheridan's ride succeeded--Victory changed into
defeat . . . . . 327

XXV THE FATAL HALT AT CEDAR CREEK
Analysis of the great mistake--Marshalling of
Testimony--Documentary proof of the error--Early's "glory enough
for one day" theory--What eye-witnesses say-- The defence of the
Confederate soldier--A complete vindication . . . . . 352

XXVI THE LAST WINTER OF THE WAR
Frequent skirmishes follow Cedar Creek--Neither commander
anxious for a general engagement--Desolation in the Valley--A fated
family--Transferred to Petersburg--A gloomy Christmas--All
troops on reduced rations--Summoned to Lee's
headquarters--Consideration of the dire straits of the army--Three possible
Courses . . . . . 373

XXVII CAPTURE OF FORT STEDMAN
In the trenches at Petersburg--General Lee's instructions--A daring
plan formed--Preparations for a night assault--An ingenious war
ruse--The fort captured with small loss--Failure
of reënforcements to arrive--Loss of guides--Necessary withdrawal
from the fort--The last effort to break Grant's hold . . . . . 395

XXVIII EVACUATION OF PETERSBURG
Religious spirit of the soldiers in extremity--Some
amusing anecdotes--Fall of Five Forks--Death of General
A. P. Hill--The line of defence stretched to
breaking--General Lee's order to withdraw
from Petersburg--Continuous lighting during the retreat--Stirring
adventure of a Confederate scout--His retaliation--Lee directs the
movement toward Appomattox . . . . . 414

XXIX THE SURRENDER
The Army of Northern Virginia reduced to a skeleton--General
Lee's calm bearing--The last Confederate council
of war--Decision upon a final attempt to break Grant's lines--The last
charge of the war--Union breastworks carried--A fruitless
Page x

victory--Flag of truce sent to General Ord--Conference
General Sheridan--An armistice . . . . . 429

XXX THE END OF THE WAR
Appomattox--25,000 men surrender--Only 8000 able to bear
Arms--Uniform courtesy of the victorious Federals--A salute
for the vanquished--What Lincoln might have done--General
Sherman's liberal terms to Johnston--An estimate of General
Lee and General Grant--The war and the reunited country . . . . .
443

INTRODUCTION TO THE MEMORIAL EDITION

GENERAL JOHN B. GORDON'S last work was the
publishing of his "Reminiscences of the Civil
War." This volume, written in his vigorous style
and broad, patriotic spirit, has been most favorably
received and read all over the country. Since his
death this memorial edition is brought out; and it
is appropriate that an additional introduction should
accompany it, somewhat in the shape of a biographical sketch.

General John Brown Gordon was an all-round
great man--a valiant and distinguished soldier, an
eminent statesman, a great orator, an author of
merit, and a public-spirited and useful citizen. He
was born in Upson County, Georgia, February 6,
1832. His father was the Rev. Zachary Herndon
Gordon. The family was of Scotch extraction,
and its members fought in the Revolutionary War.
He received his education at the university of his
native State, and by profession was a lawyer.

At the breaking out of the war, in 1861, he enlisted
as a private soldier, and was elected captain
of his company. His career was perhaps as brilliant
as that of any officer in the Confederate army. In
rapid succession he filled every grade--that of

Major, Lieutenant-Colonel, Colonel, Brigadier-General, Major-General,
and, near the end, was assigned
to duty as Lieutenant-General (by authority of the
Secretary of War), and while he never received the
commission in regular form, he commanded, at
the surrender at Appomattox, one half of the Army
of Northern Virginia, under Robert E. Lee.

At the close of the war he had earned the reputation
of being perhaps the most conspicuous and
personally valiant officer surviving, and the one
generally regarded as most promising and competent
for increased rank and larger command. His imposing and
magnificent soldierly bearing, coupled
with his splendid ringing voice and far-reaching
oratory, made him the "White-plumed Knight of
our Southland" and the "Chevalier Bayard of the
Confederate Army." He had the God-given talent
of getting in front of his troops and, in a few magnetic
appeals, inspiring them almost to madness,
and being able to lead them into the jaws of death.
This was notably done at Fredericksburg, and again
on the 12th of May, at the battle of Spottsylvania
Court House. He greatly distinguished himself on
many bloody fields. I mention now, as most prominent,
the battles of Seven Pines, Sharpsburg or
Antietam, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania Court
House, Cedar Creek, Petersburg, and Appomattox.
At Sharpsburg he was wounded five times, but
would not leave his troops till the last shot laid him
helpless and insensible on the field. A scholarly
professor of history in one of our Southern universities
recently stated that in his study of the great
war on both sides he had found but one prominent

general who, when he was in command, or when he led
a charge, had never been defeated or repulsed, and
that general was John B. Gordon. At Appomattox,
just before the surrender, when Lee's army had
"been fought to a frazzle" and was surrounded by
the enemy, General Gordon, under the most discouraging
conditions, led the last charge of the
Army of Northern Virginia, and captured the intrenchments
and several pieces of artillery in his
front just before the surrender.

He returned to his native State immediately after
the surrender at Appomattox, and discovered that
his war record had made him the most popular man
before the people of his State. His soldiers idolized
him, and his fame was a pleasant theme in almost
every household. Almost under protest, he was
elected governor in 1867, but reconstruction tactics
counted him out. He was elected United States
senator in 1872, when only forty years of age, over
two of the greatest statesmen Georgia ever had,
Alexander H. Stephens and Benjamin H. Hill. He
served, first and last, about thirteen years in the
Senate of the United States. His services in the
national Congress were brilliant and statesmanlike,
and placed the entire South under great obligations
for his display of tact, fortitude, wisdom, and patience
under great provocation at possibly the most
delicate and threatening period in the history of the
ex-Confederate States. His courage and eloquence,
used always conservatively, with the aid of such
men as Lamar of Mississippi, Hill of Georgia, Gibson of Louisiana,
and others, brought his own State
and Louisiana, South Carolina, Mississippi, and the

entire Southland under the control of their own
people. He was chosen by the Democrats in Congress
to draft an address to the people of the South,
urging patience, endurance, and an appeal to a returning
sense of justice as the cure for all wrongs.
He was elected governor of Georgia twice, and the
record shows that his messages were as able as any
emanating from the long line of distinguished men
who preceded or followed him. Able critics declared
his first Inaugural "worthy of Thomas Jefferson."

Of his last election as United States senator, a
contemporary historian has written:

It was a marvellous political victory. Unopposed until
he antagonized the sub-treasury plan of the Farmers'
Alliance, which had four fifths of the Legislature in its
favor, he was elected after the most exciting contest of
the times. In the wild enthusiasm succeeding his victory,
he was borne by the multitude through the Capitol
to the street, placed on a caisson, and drawn about the
city amid shouts and rejoicing, while the whole State
was ablaze with bonfires. His speech in the Senate in
1893, at the time of the Chicago riots, pledging the aid
of the South in maintaining law and order, rang from
one end of the country to the other.

Declining a reëlection to the Senate in 1897, he
devoted his latter years to the lecture platform.
The one object nearest his heart was to wipe out
as far as possible all bitterness between the people
of the North and the South. His great lecture,
"The Last Days of the Confederacy," was received
with enthusiasm everywhere, and he really became

the great evangel of peace and good feeling; nor was
his a new idea with him. At Appomattox, after
the surrender of Lee's army, he gathered his weeping
heroes around him, and his patriotism in that
dark hour was prophetic and grand. He told his
comrades "to bear their trial bravely, to go home
in peace, obey the laws, rebuild the country, and
work for the weal and harmony of the Republic."
This text was his theme ever afterwards, and while
stalwart in battling inch by inch in Congress for
his beloved Southland, and devoted to the tender
memories of the Confederacy, he yet set an example
of true patriotism, by adding to this devotion an
unwavering loyalty to our great reunited American
Republic. No one could move the masses as he did,
North and South, by appeals to patriotism, coupled
with pride of section and country.

The affectionate regard in which he was held
was nowhere brought out so markedly as in the
great fraternal gatherings of ex-Confederate Soldiers.
Here he appeared greatest and most beloved.
He was their only Commander from the organization of the
United Confederate Veterans until his
death. His magical leadership and personality and
wise and conservative administration gave it shape
and success. His hold on and influence over his
comrades, when he appeared among them or rose
to speak, was wonderful to behold. Even a motion
of his hand brought silence, and the great gatherings
hung on every word he spoke, and his advice decided everything.
At the Reunion at Nashville,
Tennessee, he attempted to lay down his commission
as Commander. No one who witnessed that scene

will ever forget it. The great assemblage (some six
thousand persons) rose spontaneously, and with wild
acclamation, that would admit of no parleying or
delay, commissioned him for life as leader and Commander.
I doubt if any other man ever had a greater and more
effective demonstration of love and confidence. A similar
scene occurred at Louisville. Here he raised his voice, amid great
excitement, in favor of conservative bearing toward the
Veterans of the North, who, when they had their meeting in
Fredericksburg,
Virginia, had sent friendly greetings to the Veterans of the South.

In his private life he was pure and spotless, and
an example to every American citizen. His devotion
to his wife and family was beautiful in the extreme.
In early life he had married Miss Fanny Haralson,
daughter of Hon. Hugh Anderson Haralson,
who represented Georgia in Congress for many
years, and her devotion to him equalled the great
love he bore her. She was ever near him through-out
the war, and, but for her tender and wifely
nursing when supposed to be fatally wounded at
Sharpsburg, he could never have recovered. Her
war experience would make a beautiful romance to
go down with that of her departed husband. He
never failed to try and make her the partner of his
triumphs and popularity. At many of the reunions
the old veterans accorded her as great an ovation as
they gave their Commander.

No event since the great demonstration in New Orleans when
Jefferson Davis died has brought out more strikingly the
love of the Southern people
for any one man than was shown when General

Gordon was laid away in the beautiful cemetery in
Atlanta, Georgia (January 14, 1904). Upwards of
seventy-five thousand people viewed and took part in
the ceremonies. Governors and distinguished
citizens from almost every Southern State were
present; and it was especially touching to witness
the exhibition of love and affection of surviving
Confederate soldiers, who attended in great numbers
to show their esteem for the beloved dead. The
people of the North also expressed sympathy, and
the universal grief was reflected in telegrams from
the President of the United States, the Secretary
of War, the General of the army, in resolutions of
State Legislatures in session, and in memorial meetings
in many localities.

He was a devout and humble Christian gentleman.
I know of no man more beloved at the South,
and he was probably the most popular Southern
man among the people of the North.

MEMORIAL SKETCH OF THE LAST HOURS,
DEATH, AND FUNERAL OF GENERAL
JOHN B. GORDON

ON Wednesday morning, January 6, 1904, General
Gordon was stricken with his last illness.
Less than three weeks before, he had come to his
winter home on Biscayne Bay, in Florida, where
the sunlight and balmy air, always a delight to
him, had seemed to revive him and stir his enthusiasm
to a degree unusual even in one of his energetic and
joyous temperament.

Those great qualities which set him high among
men illumined with peculiar lustre these last
weeks, making them an epitome of his whole life.
Unconquerable energy, undying enthusiasm--above
all, unselfish love--these were the traits which
had borne him through the battles of war and the
battles of peace, and through years of peerless civic
service; these the traits which uplifted the work of
his stalwart years and bore his spirit indomitable
through years of physical frailty, and which at the
very last shone through the mists of his dying
hours with the glowing beauty of a setting sun.
Only the day before his illness, he was tramping
over the fields and through the orchards with his
grandson, planning with the delight of a boy.

"My son, this shall be a paradise for your grandmother and all
of us some day."

Before noon on Wednesday he was unconscious,
and it seemed he would sink out of sight without
a sign; but in forty-eight hours he rallied. On
Saturday morning he looked out on the sunlit bay
and at the great palms waving against a blue sky,
and said in low and broken tones: "It seems a poor
use of God's beautiful gifts to us to be ill on a day
like this!" From then until the end he was conscious
enough to be constantly solicitous of the
comfort of those about him, and to give during
every fleeting hour some tender thought to that one
who had been the comrade of his soul for nearly
fifty years--"his helpmeet in the loftiest sense,
his comforter, his counsellor, his friend";1 and as
his beautiful spirit was poised for its glorious flight,
he gave to her the last look and smile and touch of
recognition.

At five minutes past ten o'clock on Saturday
night, January 9, he passed into another life, as
peacefully as a little child falls asleep. Within an
hour the message had sped over the wires to the
whole country; and the crowds around the bulletin
boards in many Southern cities turned silently, and
with tear-dimmed eyes scattered to their homes.
Before midnight newsboys were crying the sad news
up and down the residence streets; and on Sunday
morning the heart of the whole South seemed to
go out in one great throb of pain and sympathy.
From every quarter of the country, as fast as the
wires could carry them, came messages of sympathy

from those who loved the man, and from those
who mourned the nation's loss.

On Sunday evening, at the request of the people
of Miami, Florida, the body was borne, with military
escort, to the Presbyterian church in that
little city on the bay, to lie there in state until the
funeral train should leave for Atlanta. A detachment of
Florida troops accompanied the remains
to Atlanta, and at the State line this guard of honor
was augmented by members of the staff of Georgia's
governor. At every station beautiful flowers were
brought to the funeral car, and, when time allowed,
old Confederate veterans, with tears streaming down
their rugged cheeks, filed by to look for the last
time on the face of their beloved leader.

"Hats off! Gordon comes home to-day." 1

"He comes--not as he came, one sunny day in spring
nearly twoscore years ago, wearing the crested cypress
of defeat as gravely proud as some successful Caesar
might wear the conqueror's coronal of bays; not as he
came when he laid aside the cares of statesmanship, and
loftily enshrined in love and gratitude for those victories
of peace no less renowned than war, voluntarily retire
from the highest parliament of the world; not as he came
for so many successive years from the annual camp-fires
where the broken battalions met to exchange their stirring
stories of the valor of other days, and, above all, to
sit once more under the magic spell of his inspiring
tongue. He has come home as, in the course of nature,
he needs must come at last, covered with the sable trappings
of grief, heralded by the slow monody of muffled
drums, followed by the measured march of a people dissolved
in the unspeakable bitterness of tears." 2

In the cold gray dawn of the January morning a
great throng overflowed the station, and filled the
streets outside, as the train rolled into Atlanta, bearing
the body of General Gordon. The official escort
awaiting the train was composed of the new
commander-in-chief of the Confederate Veterans Association,
and other ex-Confederate officers, members
and commanders of four camps of Confederate
Veterans, the Confederate Veterans on the Atlanta
police force, mounted police, and State militia.
Besides these, thousands stood with heads bared, and
bowed in reverence, as the casket was removed and
borne to the hearse by the grizzled heroes who had
followed this leader in war, and learned of him the
lessons of peace. As the pall-bearers moved toward
the hearse, an old veteran approached the casket,
hurriedly, removed his overcoat, handed it to a by-stander,
and jerking off his worn and faded jacket,
of Confederate gray, asked, in tremulous tones,
"May I lay it on his coffin just one minute?" His
request was granted; and, as he lifted the jacket
tenderly and slipped it again over his bent shoulders,
he said between sobs: "Now thousands could n't buy it from me!"

The procession moved to the State Capitol, and
there in the rotunda, on a catafalque covered with
flowers, the casket was placed. Around the great
circular room, at intervals, drooped the flag of his
beloved Confederacy, for which he had given the
first blood of his young manhood, and the flag of a
reunited country, to which he had given the richest
offerings of his mature years. Palm branches from
Florida, floral tributes from all over the South and

from the North, garlanded four tall pillars, and hung
in fragrant masses on the casket, on the walls, and on
stands about the corridor. And thus "the first citizen
of the South lay in state in Georgia's Capitol."1
Tens of thousands passed in double line to look
upon the face of a man "who was loved as seldom
man was ever loved on earth."2 The Capitol doors
were kept open at night that the workingmen might
see his face, and it was long after midnight before
the special guard of veterans and militia was left
alone with its precious charge.

On Thursday morning, at ten o'clock, memorial
exercises were held in the Georgia Hall of Representatives.
While addresses were being made by
men of distinction who had served with him in war
and in peace, men, women, and children still passed,
in unbroken line, by the casket in the rotunda.
Immediately following these exercises, religious
services were held in the Presbyterian church adjoining
the Capitol. A way was opened through
the throng, which packed the Capitol corridors and
massed in the square and streets outside; and the
casket was borne across by his old comrades. At
Mrs. Gordon's request the veterans were given first
place in the church after the family.

"The thing that made Gordon great--that which
bound him close to men and made him dear to them--
was his mighty heart, strong as the ramparts of the hills
through which he led his columns, gentle and pure as the
kind zephyrs of his own Southland . . . . Honest search
after the source of Gordon's superb power cannot fail to
show that the fountain of his strength was not merely in

his right arm, nor in his keen and flashing blade, nor yet
in his alertness of mind and vigor of intellect, but in the
meeting of these qualities with a pure spirit--these
sterling virtues fused behind the crystal of his soul,
forming the true mirror of knighthood . . . . He was
master of many because master of
himself."1

From the rich treasury of such a nature the
ministers of Christ drew their lessons over the
bier of this "prince of Christian
chivalry."2

During the hours of the funeral, public and private
schools and places of business were closed.
All flags hung at half-mast, and in some cities
remained so for thirty days. Seventeen guns were
fired at intervals of half an hour during the day.
Throughout Georgia and the entire South, memorial services
were held at this hour, and from
morning till night bells tolled out the grief of the
people.

The staff of the Department of the Gulf, United
States Army, the Atlanta Camp, G. A. R., the Sixth
Regiment United States infantry, stationed near
Atlanta, asked for place in the line of the funeral
procession. They wished to join with others of the
North in paying tribute to the man "who had done
most to make them forget the animosities of war--
and whose course since that time had marked
him with the attributes of true
greatness."3

It was a "sweet and solemn pageant," that
funeral procession, which moved to muffled drumbeats
through the city streets, all filled with a silent
throng and hushed in reverent sorrow: veterans

of the Blue and of the Gray; men of America's army
to-day, regulars and militia; corps of cadets from
Southern military schools; patriotic organizations;
drum corps and bugle corps; and a host of private
citizens: and when the hearse stopped at the lot
selected by the Ladies' Confederate Memorial Association,
the end of the procession was still down in
the city streets.

And now

"The mortal remains of General John B.
Gordon--soldier and statesman--lie in Oakland Cemetery . . . .
The muffled drum has beat the funeral march, and grief
has found voice in the piercing minor of the fifes. But
from over the whole South to-day there rises a strange
music which blends in one large requiem--not the dirge
of unavailing sorrow, but rather a paean of heroic triumph
reciting the valorous deeds of him whom the people
mourn." 1

1 Atlanta "Journal," January 14, 1904.

And those who knew him and loved him best,
whose lives are most enriched by the matchless
loveliness of his life, are lifted up in his death, and,
in the midst of their grief, open their hearts to the
countless thousands who mourn his loss, because
"he had kept the whiteness of his soul." "His
name becomes the heritage of his people, and his
fame the glory of a nation."2

INTRODUCTION

FOR many years I have been urged to place on
record my reminiscences of the war between the
States. In undertaking the task now, it is not my
purpose to attempt a comprehensive description of
that great struggle, nor an elaborate analysis of
the momentous interests and issues involved. The
time may not have arrived for a full and fair history
of that most interesting period in the Republic's
life. The man capable of writing it with
entire justice to both sides is perhaps yet unborn.
He may appear, however, at a future day, fully
equipped for the great work. If endowed with the
requisite breadth and clearness of view, with
inflexible mental integrity and absolute freedom from
all bias, he will produce the most instructive and
thrilling record in the world's deathless annals, and
cannot fail to make a contribution of measureless
value to the American people and to the cause of
free government throughout the world.

Conscious of my own inability to meet the demands
of so great an undertaking, I have not attempted it,
but with an earnest desire to contribute

something toward such future history these reminiscences
have been written. I have endeavored
to make my review of that most heroic era so condensed
as to claim the attention of busy people,
and so impartial as to command the confidence of
the fair-minded in all sections. It has been my
fixed purpose to make a brief but dispassionate
and judicially fair analysis of the divergent opinions
and ceaseless controversies which for half a
century produced an ever-widening alienation between
the sections, and which finally plunged into
the fiercest and bloodiest of fratricidal wars a
great and enlightened people who were of the same
race, supporters of the same Constitution, and joint
heirs of the same freedom. I have endeavored to
demonstrate that the courage displayed and the
ratio of losses sustained were unprecedented in
modern warfare. I have also recorded in this volume
a large number of those characteristic and
thrilling incidents which illustrate a unique and
hitherto unwritten phase of the war, the story of
which should not be lost, because it is luminous
with the noblest lessons. Many of these incidents
came under my own observation. They marked
every step of the war's progress, were often witnessed
by both armies, and were of almost daily
occurrence in the camps, on the marches, and
between the lines; increasing in frequency and
pathos as the war progressed, and illustrating the

It will be found, I trust, that no injustice has
been done to either section, to any army, or to any
of the great leaders, but that the substance and
spirit of the following pages will tend rather to lift
to a higher plane the estimate placed by victors
and vanquished upon their countrymen of the opposing
section, and thus strengthen the sentiment
of intersectional fraternity which is essential to
complete national unity.

REMINISCENCES OF THE
CIVIL WAR

CHAPTER I

MY FIRST COMMAND AND THE OUTBREAK OF THE WAR

A company of mountaineers--Joe Brown's
pikes--The Raccoon Roughs--The
first Rebel yell--A flag presented to the company--Arrival at
Montgomery, Alabama--Analysis of the causes of the war--Slavery's part
in it--Liberty in the Union of the States, and liberty in the
independence of
the States.

THE outbreak of war found me in the mountains of Georgia,
Tennessee, and Alabama, engaged in the development of coal-mines.
This does not mean that I
was a citizen of three States; but it does mean that I
lived so near the lines that my mines were in Georgia, my house
in Alabama, and my post-office in Tennessee.
The first company of soldiers, therefore, with which I entered
the service was composed of stalwart mountaineers from the three States. I
had
been educated for the bar
and for a time practised law in Atlanta. In September, 1854,
I had married Miss Fanny Haralson,
third daughter of General Hugh A. Haralson, of La Grange,
Georgia. The wedding occurred on her seventeenth birthday and when I was but
twenty-two. We had two
children, both boys. The struggle between devotion to
my family on the one hand and duty to my
country on the other was most trying to my sensibilities. My
spirit had been caught up by the flaming enthusiasm that swept
like a prairie-fire through the land, and I
hastened to unite with the brave men of the mountains
in organizing a company of volunteers. But what

was I to do with the girl-wife and the two little boys? The
wife and mother was no less taxed in her effort to settle
this momentous question. But finally yielding to the
promptings of her own heart and to her unerring sense of
duty, she ended doubt as to what disposition was to be
made of her by announcing that she intended to
accompany me to the war, leaving her children with my
mother and faithful "Mammy Mary." I rejoiced at her
decision then, and had still greater reasons for rejoicing
at it afterward, when I felt through every fiery ordeal the
inspiration of her near presence, and had, at need, the
infinite comfort of her tender nursing.

The mountaineers did me the honor to elect me their
captain. It was the first office I had ever held, and I verily
believed it would be the last; for I expected to fight with
these men till the war ended or until I should be killed.
Our first decision was to mount and go as cavalry. We had
not then learned, as we did later, the full meaning of that
war-song, "If you want to have a good time, jine the
cavalry"; but like most Southerners we were inured to
horseback, and all preferred that great arm of the service.

This company of mounted men was organized as soon as
a conflict seemed probable and prior to any call for
volunteers. They were doomed to a disappointment, "No
cavalry now needed" was the laconic and stunning reply to
the offer of our services. What was to be done, was the
perplexing question. The proposition to wait until
mounted men were needed was promptly negatived by
the suggestion that we were so far from any point where a
battle was likely to occur, and so hidden from view by the
surrounding mountains, that we might be forgotten and the
war might end before we had a chance.

"Let us dismount and go at once as infantry." This
proposition was carried with a shout and by an almost
unanimous vote. My own vote and whatever influence

I possessed were given in favor of the suggestion,
although my desire for cavalry service had grown to a
passion. Accustomed to horseback on my father's
plantation from my early childhood, and with an untutored
imagination picturing the wild sweep of my chargers upon
belching batteries and broken lines of infantry, it was to
me, as well as to my men, a sad descent from dashing
cavalry to a commonplace company of slow, plodding
foot-soldiers. Reluctantly, therefore, we abandoned our horses,
and in order certainly to reach the point of action before
the war was over, we resolved to go at once to the front
as infantry, without waiting for orders, arms, or uniforms.
Not a man in the company had the slightest military training,
and the captain himself knew very little of military tactics.

The new government that was to be formed had no
standing army as a nucleus around which the volunteers
could be brought into compact order, with a centre of
disciplined and thoroughly drilled soldiery; and the States
which were to form it had but few arms, and no artisans or
factories to supply them. The old-fashioned squirrel rifles
and double-barrelled shot-guns were called into requisition.
Governor Joseph E. Brown, of Georgia, put shops in the
State to work, making what were called "Joe Brown's
pikes." They were a sort of rude bayonet, or steel lance,
fastened, not to guns, but to long poles or handles, and
were to be given to men who had no other arms. Of
course, few if any of these pikemen ever had occasion to
use these warlike implements, which were worthy of the
Middle Ages, but those who bore them were as gallant
knights as ever levelled a lance in close quarters. I may
say that very few bayonets of any kind were actually used
in battle, so far as my observation extended. The one line
or the other usually gave way under the galling fire of
small arms, grape, and canister, before the bayonet could
be brought into

requisition. The bristling points and the glitter of the bayonets
were fearful to look upon as they were levelled in front of a
charging line; but they were rarely reddened with blood. The
day of the bayonet is passed except for use in hollow squares, or
in resisting cavalry charges, or as an implement in constructing
light and temporary fortifications. It may still serve a purpose in
such emergencies or to impress the soldier's imagination, as the
loud-sounding and ludicrous gongs are supposed to stiffen the
backs and steady the nerves of the grotesque soldiers of China.
Of course, Georgia's able war governor did not contemplate any
very serious execution with these pikes; but the volunteers came
in such numbers and were so eager for the fray that something
had to be done; and this device served its purpose. It at least
shows the desperate straits in securing arms to which the South
was driven, even after seizing the United States arsenals within
the Confederate territory.

The irrepressible humor and ready rustic wit which afterward
relieved the tedium of the march and broke the monotony of the
camp, and which, like a star in the darkness, seemed to grow
more brilliant as the gloom of war grew denser, had already
begun to sparkle in the intercourse of the volunteers. A
woodsman who was noted as a "crack shot" among his hunting
companions felt sure that he was going, to win fame as a select
rifleman in the army; for he said that in killing a squirrel he
always put the bullet through the head, though the squirrel might
be perched at the time on the topmost limb of the tallest tree. An
Irishman who had seen service in the Mexican War, and was
attentively listening to this young hunter's boast, fixed his
twinkling eye upon the aspiring rifleman and said to him: "Yes;
but Dan, me boy, ye must ricollict that the squirrel had no gon in
his hand to shoot back at ye." The young huntsman had not
thought about that; but he doubtless found

later on, as the marksmen of both armies did, that it made
a vast difference in the accuracy of aim when those in front
not only had "gons" in their hands, but were firing them
with distracting rapidity. This rude Irish philosopher had
explained in a sentence one cause of the wild and aimless
firing which wasted more tons of lead in a battle than all
its dead victims would weigh.

There was at the outbreak of the war and just preceding
it a class of men both North and South over whose
inconsistencies the thoughtful, self-poised, and
determined men who did the fighting made many jokes,
as the situation grew more serious. It was that class of
men in both sections who were most resolute in words
and most prudent in acts; who urged the sections to the
conflict and then did little to help them out of it; who, like
the impatient war-horse, snuffed the battle from afar--very
far: but who, when real war began to roll its crimson tide
nearer and nearer to them, came to the conclusion that it
was better for the country, as well as for themselves, to
labor in other spheres; and that it was their duty, as
America's great humorist put it, to sacrifice not
themselves but their wives' relations on patriotism's altar.
One of these furious leaders at the South declared that if
we would secede from the Union there would be no war,
and if there should be a war, we could "whip the Yankees
with children's pop-guns." When, after the war, this same
gentleman was addressing an audience, he was asked by
an old maimed soldier: "Say, Judge, ain't you the same man that told us
before the war that we could whip the Yankees with pop-guns?"

then capital of Georgia. At Atlanta a telegram from the
governor met us, telling us to go back home, and stay there until
our services were needed. Our discomfiture can be better
imagined than described. In fact, there broke out at once in my
ranks a new rebellion. These rugged mountaineers resolved that
they would not go home; that they had a right to go to the war,
had started to the war, and were not going to be trifled with by
the governor or any one else. Finally, after much persuasion, and
by the cautious exercise of the authority vested in me by my
office of captain, I prevailed on them to get on board the home-bound
train. As the engine-bell rang and the whistle blew for the
train to start, the rebellion broke loose again with double fury.
The men rushed to the front of the train, uncoupled the cars
from the engine, and gravely informed me that they had
reconsidered and were not going back; that they intended to go
to the war, and that if Governor Brown would not accept them,
some other governor would. Prophetic of future dash as this wild
impetuosity might be, it did not give much promise of soldierly
discipline; but I knew my men and did not despair. I was
satisfied that the metal in them was the best of steel and only
needed careful tempering.

They disembarked and left the empty cars on the track, with
the trainmen looking on in utter amazement. There was no
course left me but to march them through the streets of Atlanta
to a camp on the outskirts. The march, or rather straggle, through that city was
a sight marvellous to behold and never to be forgotten. Totally
undisciplined and undrilled, no two of these men marched
abreast; no two kept the same step; no two wore the same
colored coats or trousers. The only pretence at uniformity was
the rough fur caps made of raccoon skins, with long, bushy,
streaked raccoon tails hanging from behind them. The streets
were packed with men,

women, and children, eager to catch a glimpse of this grotesque
company. Naturally we were the observed of all observers.
Curiosity was on tip-toe, and from the crowded sidewalks there
came to me the inquiry, "Are you the captain of that company,
sir?" With a pride which I trust was pardonable, I indicated that I
was. In a moment there came to me the second inquiry, "What
company is that, sir?" Up to this time no name had been chosen--
at least, none had been announced to the men. I had myself,
however, selected a name which I considered both poetic and
appropriate, and I replied to the question, "This company is the
Mountain Rifles." Instantly a tall mountaineer said in a tone not
intended for his captain, but easily overheard by his companions
and the bystanders: "Mountain hell! we are no Mountain Rifles;
we are the Raccoon Roughs." It is scarcely necessary to say
that my selected name was never heard of again. This towering
Ajax had killed it by a single blow. The name he gave us clung to
the company during all of its long and faithful service.

Once in camp, we kept the wires hot with telegrams to
governors of other States, imploring them to give us a chance.
Governor Moore, of Alabama, finally responded, graciously
consenting to incorporate the captain of the "Raccoon Roughs"
and his coon-capped company into one of the regiments soon to
be organized. The reading of this telegram evoked from my men
the first wild Rebel yell it was my fortune to hear. Even then it
was weird and thrilling. Through all the stages of my subsequent
promotions, in all the battles in which I was engaged, this same
exhilarating shout from these same trumpet-like throats rang in
my ears, growing fainter and fainter as these heroic men
became fewer and fewer at the end of each bloody day's work;
and when the last hour of the war came, in the last desperate
charge at Appomattox, the few and broken remnants of

the Raccoon Roughs were still near their first captain's side,
cheering him with the dying echoes of that first yell in the
Atlanta camp.

Alabama's governor had given us the coveted "chance," and
with bounding hearts we joined the host of volunteers then
rushing to Montgomery. The line of our travel was one unbroken
scene of enthusiasm. Bonfires blazed from the hills at night, and
torch-light processions, with drums and fifes, paraded the streets
of the towns. In the absence of real cannon, blacksmiths' anvils
were made to thunder our welcome. Vast throngs gathered at
the depots, filling the air with their shoutings, and bearing banners
with all conceivable devices, proclaiming Southern independence,
and pledging the last dollar and man for the success of the
cause. Staid matrons and gayly bedecked maidens rushed upon
the cars, pinned upon our lapels the blue cockades, and cheered
us by chanting in thrilling chorus:

In Dixie-land I take my stand To live and die in Dixie.

At other points they sang "The Bonnie Blue Flag," and the
Raccoon Roughs, as they were thenceforward known, joined in
the transporting chorus:

Hurrah, hurrah, for Southern rights hurrah!
Hurrah for the Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star!

The Hon. R. M. T. Hunter, of Virginia, who had been
Speaker of the National House of Representatives, and United
States senator, and who afterward became the Confederate
Secretary of State and one of the Hampton Roads
commissioners to meet President Lincoln and the Federal
representatives, was travelling upon the same train that carried
my company to Montgomery. This famous and venerable
statesman, on his way to Alabama's capital to aid in organizing
the new Government, made,

in answer to the popular demand, a number of speeches at the
different stations. His remarks on these occasions were usually
explanatory of the South's attitude in the threatened conflict.
They were concise, clear, and forcible. The people did not need
argument; but they applauded his every utterance, as he
carefully described the South's position as one not of aggression
but purely of defence; discussed the doctrine promulgated in the
Declaration of the Fathers, that all governments derive their just
powers from the consent of the governed; asserted the
sovereignty of the States, and their right to peaceably assume
that sovereignty, as evidenced by the declaration of New York,
Rhode Island, and Virginia when they entered the Union;
explained the protection given the South's peculiar property by
the plain provisions of the Constitution and the laws; urged the
necessity of separation both for Southern security and the
permanent peace of the sections; and closed with the
declaration that, while there was no trace of authority in the
Constitution for the invasion and coercion of a sovereign State,
yet it was the part of prudence and of patriotism to prepare for
defence in case of necessity.

Although I was a young man, yet, as the only captain on
board, it fell to my lot also to respond to frequent calls. In the
midst of this wild excitement and boundless enthusiasm, I was
induced to make some promises which I afterward found
inconvenient and even impossible to fulfil. A flag was presented
bearing a most embarrassing motto. That motto consisted of two
words: "No Retreat." I was compelled to accept it. There was,
indeed, no retreat for me then; and in my speech accepting the
flag I assured the fair donors that those coon-capped boys would
make that motto ring with their cracking rifles on every
battle-field; and in the ardor and inexperience of my young manhood, I
related to these ladies and to the crowds at the depot the story
of

the little drummer-boy of Switzerland who, when captured and
ordered to beat upon his drum a retreat, proudly replied,
"Switzerland knows no such music!" Gathering additional
inspiration from the shouts and applause which the story evoked,
I exclaimed, "And these brave mountaineers and the young
Confederacy, like glorious little Switzerland, will never know a
retreat!" My men applauded and sanctioned this outburst of
inconsiderate enthusiasm, but we learned better after a while. A
little sober experience vastly modified and assuaged our youthful
impetuosity. War is a wonderful developer, as well as destroyer,
of men; and our four years of tuition in it equalled in both these
particulars at least forty years of ordinary schooling. The first
battle carried us through the rudimentary course of a military
education; and several months before the four years' course was
ended, the thoughtful ones began to realize that though the
expense account had been great, it had at least reasonably well
prepared us for final graduation, and for receiving the brief little
diploma handed to us at Appomattox.

If any apology be needed for my pledge to the patriotic women
who presented the little flag with the big motto, "No Retreat," it
must be found in the depth of the conviction that our cause was
just. From great leaders and constitutional expounders, from
schools and colleges, from debates in Congress, in the convention
that adopted the Constitution, and from discussions on the
hustings, we had learned the lesson of the sovereignty of the
States. We had imbibed these political principles from our
childhood. We were, therefore, prepared to defend them, ready
to die for them, and it was impossible at the beginning for us to
believe that they would be seriously and forcibly assailed.

But I must return to our trip to Montgomery. We reached that
city at night to find it in a hubbub over

the arrival of enthusiastic, shouting volunteers. The hotels and
homes were crowded with visiting statesmen and private citizens,
gathered by a common impulse around the cradle of the new-born
Confederacy. There was a determined look on every face, a fervid
prayer on every lip, and a bounding hope in every heart. There was
the rumbling of wagons distributing arms and ammunition at every
camp, and the tramping of freshly enlisted men, on every street.
There was a roar of cannon on the hills and around the Capitol
booming welcome to the incoming patriots; and all nature seemed
palpitating in sympathy with the intensity of popular excitement. It
fell to the lot of the Raccoon Roughs to be assigned to the Sixth
Alabama Regiment, and, contrary to my wishes and most
unexpectedly to me, I was unanimously elected major.

When my company of mountaineers reached Montgomery,
the Provisional Government of the "Confederate States of
America" had been organized. At first it was composed only of
six States: South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida,
Mississippi, and Louisiana. The States of Texas, Virginia,
Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina were admitted into the
Southern Union in the order, I believe, in which I have named
them. Thus was launched the New Republic, with only eleven
stars on its banner; but it took as its chart the same old
American Constitution, or one so nearly like it that it contained
the same limitations upon Federal power, the same guarantees of
the rights of the States, the same muniments of public and
personal liberty.

The historian of the future, who attempts to chronicle the
events of this period and analyze the thoughts and purposes of
the people, will find far greater unanimity at the South than at
the North. This division at the North did not last long; but it
existed in a marked degree for some time after the secession
movement began

and after twenty or more United States forts, arsenals and
barracks had been seized by State authorities, and even after
the steamer Star of the West had been fired upon by State
troops and driven back from the entrance of Charleston Harbor.

At the South, the action of each State in withdrawing from the
Union was the end, practically, of all division within the borders
of such State; and the roar of the opening battle at Fort Sumter
in South Carolina was the signal for practical unanimity at the
North.

Prior to actual secession there was even at the South more or
less division of sentiment--not as to principle, but as to policy.
Scarcely a man could be found in all the Southern States who
doubted the constitutional right of a State to withdraw from the
Union; but many of its foremost men thought that such
movement was ill-advised or should be delayed. Among these
were Robert E. Lee, who became the commander-in-chief of all
the Confederate armies; Alexander Hamilton Stephens, who
became the Confederate Vice-President; Benjamin H. Hill, who
was a Confederate senator and one of the Confederate
administration's most ardent and perhaps its most eloquent
supporter; and even Jefferson Davis himself is said to have shed
tears when, at his seat in the United States Senate, he received
the telegram announcing that Mississippi had actually passed the
ordinance of secession. The speech of Mr. Davis on taking leave
of the Senate shows his loyal devotion to the Republic's flag, for
which he had shed his blood in Mexico. In profoundly sincere
and pathetic words he thus alludes to his unfeigned sorrow at the
thought of parting with the Stars and Stripes. He said: "I shall be
pardoned if I here express the deep sorrow which always
overwhelms me when I think of taking a last leave of that object
of early affection and proud association, feeling that henceforth

it is not to be the banner which by day and by night I am
ready to follow, to hail with the rising and bless with the setting
sun."

He agreed, however, with an overwhelming majority of the
Southern people, in the opinion that both honor and security, as
well as permanent peace, demanded separation. Referring to the denial
of the right of Southerners to
carry their property in slaves into the common Territories, he
said: "Your votes refuse to recognize our domestic institutions,
which preëxisted the formation
of the Union--our property, which was guarded by the
Constitution. You refuse us that equality without which we
should be degraded if we remained in the Union. . . . Is there a
senator on the other side who, to-day, will agree that we shall
have equal enjoyment of the Territories of the United States? Is
there one who will deny that we have equally paid in their
purchases and equally bled in their acquisition in war? . . . Whose
is the fault, then, if the Union be dissolved? . . . If you desire, at
this last moment, to avert civil war, so be it; it is better so. If you will
but allow us to separate from you peaceably,
since we cannot live peaceably together, to leave with the rights
we had before we were united, since we cannot enjoy them in
the Union, then there are many relations, drawn from the
associations of our (common) struggles from the Revolutionary
period to the present day, which
may be beneficial to you as well as to us."

Abraham Lincoln, on the other hand, the newly elected
President, was deeply imbued with the conviction that
the future welfare of the Republic demanded that slavery should
be prohibited forever in all the Territories. Indeed, upon such
platform he had been nominated and elected. He, therefore,
urged his friends not to yield on this point. His language was:
"On the territorial question--that is, the question of extending slavery
under national auspices--I am inflexible. I am for no compromise

which assists or permits the extension of the institution on
soil owned by the Nation." *

Thus these two great leaders of antagonistic sectional thought
were pitted against each other before they had actually taken in
hand the reins of hostile governments. The South in her
marvellous fecundity had given birth to both these illustrious
Americans. Both were of Southern lineage and born under
Southern skies. Indeed, they were born within a few months and
miles of each other, and nurtured by Kentucky as their common
mother. But they were destined in God's mysterious providence
to find homes in different sections, to grow up under different
institutions, to imbibe in youth and early manhood opposing
theories of constitutional construction, to become the most
conspicuous representatives of conflicting civilizations, and the
respective Presidents of contending republics.

After long, arduous, and distinguished services to
their country and to liberty, both of these great sons of
the South were doomed to end their brilliant careers in
a manner shocking to the sentiment of enlightened
Christendom. The one was to die disfranchised by the
Government he had long and faithfully served and for
the triumph of whose flag he had repeatedly pledged his
life. The other was to meet his death by an assassin's
bullet, at a period when his life, more than that of any
other man, seemed essential to the speedy pacification
of his country.

As stated, there was less division of sentiment in the South at
this period than at the North. It is a great mistake to suppose, as
was believed by Northern people, that Southern politicians were
"dragooning the masses," or beguiling them into secession. The
literal truth is that the people were leading the leaders. The rush
of volunteers was so great when we reached Montgomery

that my company, the Raccoon Roughs, felt that they
were the favorites of fortune when they found the company
enrolled among the "accepted." Hon. L. P. Walker, of Alabama,
the first Secretary of War, was literally overwhelmed by the vast
numbers wishing to enlist. The applicants in companies and
regiments fatigued and bewildered him. The pressure was so
great during his office hours that comparatively few of those
who sought places in the fighting line could reach him. With a
military ardor and patriotic enthusiasm rarely equalled in any age,
the volunteers actually waylaid the War Secretary on the streets
to urge him to accept at once their services. He stated that he
found it necessary, when leaving his office for his hotel, to go by
some unfrequented way, to avoid the persistent appeals of those
who had commands ready to take the field. Before the
Confederate Government left Montgomery for Richmond, about
360,000 men and boys, representing the best of Southern
manhood, had offered their services, and were ready to pledge
their fortunes and their lives to the cause of Southern
independence. What was the meaning of this unparalleled
spontaneity that pervaded all classes of the Southern people?
The only answer is that it was the impulse of self-defence. One
case will illustrate this unsolicited outburst of martial enthusiasm;
this excess of patriotism above the supposed exigencies of the
hour; this vast surplus of volunteers, beyond the power of the
new Government to arm. Mr. W. C. Heyward, of South
Carolina, was a gentleman of fortune and a West Pointer,
graduating in the same class with President Davis. As soon as
the Confederate Government was organized, Mr. Heyward went
to Montgomery in person to tender his services with an entire
regiment. He was unable for some time to obtain even an
interview on the subject, and utterly failed to secure an
acceptance of himself or his regiment. Returning to his home disappointed,

this wealthy, thoroughly educated, and trained military
man joined the Home Guards, and died doing duty as a private in
the ranks.

I know of nothing in all history that more brilliantly illustrates
the lofty spirit, the high and holy impulse that sways a people
aroused by the sentiment of self-defence, than this spontaneous
uprising of Southern youth and manhood; than this readiness to
stand for inherited convictions and constitutional rights, as they
understood them; than the marvellous unanimity with which they
rushed to the front with old flint and steel muskets, long-barrelled
squirrel rifles, and double-barrelled shot-guns, in defence of their
soil, their States, their homes, and, as they verily believed, in
defence of imperilled liberty.

There is no book in existence, I believe, in which the ordinary
reader can find an analysis of the issues between the two
sections, which fairly represents both the North and the South.
Although it would require volumes to contain the great
arguments, I shall attempt here to give a brief summary of the
causes of our sectional controversy, and it will be my purpose to
state the cases of the two sections so impartially that just-minded
people on both sides will admit the statement to be judicially fair.

The causes of the war will be found at the foundation of our
political fabric, in our complex organism, in the fundamental law,
in the Constitution itself, in the conflicting constructions which it
invited, and in the institution of slavery which it recognized and
was intended to protect. If asked what was the real issue involved
in our unparalleled conflict, the average American citizen will
reply, "The negro"; and it is fair to say that had there been no
slavery there would have been no war. But there would have
been no slavery if the South's protests could have availed when it
was first introduced; and now that it is gone, although its sudden
and violent

abolition entailed upon the South directly and incidentally a series
of woes which no pen can describe, yet it is true that in no
section would its reëstablishment be more strongly and
universally resisted. The South steadfastly maintains that
responsibility for the presence of this political Pandora's box in
this Western world cannot be laid at her door. When the
Constitution was adopted and the Union formed, slavery existed
in practically all the States; and it is claimed by the Southern
people that its disappearance from the Northern and its
development in the Southern States is due to climatic conditions
and industrial exigencies rather than to the existence or absence
of great moral ideas.

Slavery was undoubtedly the immediate fomenting cause of
the woful American conflict. It was the great political factor
around which the passions of the sections had long been
gathered--the tallest pine in the political forest around whose top
the fiercest lightnings were to blaze and whose trunk was
destined to be shivered in the earthquake shocks of war. But
slavery was far from being the sole cause of the prolonged
conflict. Neither its destruction on the one hand, nor its defence
on the other, was the energizing force that held the contending
armies to four years of bloody work. I apprehend that if all living
Union soldiers were summoned to the witness-stand, every one
of them would testify that it was the preservation of the
American Union and not the destruction of Southern slavery that
induced him to volunteer at the call of his country. As for the
South, it is enough to say that perhaps eighty per cent. of her
armies were neither slave-holders, nor had the remotest interest
in the institution. No other proof, however, is needed than the
undeniable fact that at any period of the war from its beginning
to near its close the South could have saved slavery by simply
laying down its arms and returning to the Union.

We must, therefore, look beyond the institution of slavery for
the fundamental issues which dominated and inspired all classes
of the contending sections. It is not difficult to find them. The
"Old Man Eloquent," William E. Gladstone, who was perhaps
England's foremost statesman of the century, believed that the
Government formed by our fathers was the noblest political fabric
ever devised by the brain of man. This undoubtedly is true; and
yet before these inspired builders were dead, controversy arose as
to the nature and powers of their free constitutional government.
Indeed, in the very convention that framed the Constitution the
clashing theories and bristling arguments of 1787 presaged the
glistening bayonets of 1861. In the cabinet of the first President,
the contests between Hamilton and Jefferson, representatives of
conflicting constitutional constructions, were so persistent and
fierce as to disturb the harmony of executive councils and tax the
patience of Washington. The disciples of each of these political
prophets numbered in their respective ranks the greatest
statesmen and purest patriots. The followers of each continuously
battled for these conflicting theories with a power and earnestness
worthy of the founders of the Republic. Generation after
generation, in Congress, on the hustings, and through the
press, these irreconcilable doctrines were urged by constitutional
expounders, until their arguments became ingrained into the very
fibre of the brain and conscience of the sections. The long war
of words between the leaders waxed at last into a war of guns
between their followers.

During the entire life of the Republic the respective rights and
powers of the States and general government had furnished a
question for endless controversy. In process of time this
controversy assumed a somewhat sectional phase. The
dominating thought of the North and of the South may be
summarized in a few sentences.

The South maintained with the depth of religious conviction that
the Union formed under the Constitution was a Union of consent
and not of force; that the original States were not the creatures
but the creators of the Union; that these States had gained their
independence, their freedom, and their sovereignty from the
mother country, and had not surrendered these on entering the
Union; that by the express terms of the Constitution all rights and
powers not delegated were reserved to the States; and the South
challenged the North to find one trace of authority in that
Constitution for invading and coercing a sovereign State.

The North, on the other hand, maintained with the utmost
confidence in the correctness of her position that the Union
formed under the Constitution was intended to be perpetual; that
sovereignty was a unit and could not be divided; that whether or
not there was any express power granted in the Constitution for
invading a State, the right of self-preservation was inherent in all
governments; that the life of the Union was essential to the life
of liberty; or, in the words of Webster, "liberty and union are
one and inseparable."

To the charge of the North that secession was rebellion and
treason, the South replied that the epithets of rebel and traitor did
not deter her from the assertion of her independence, since
these same epithets had been familiar to the ears of Washington
and Hancock and Adams and Light Horse Harry Lee. In
vindication of her right to secede, she appealed to the essential
doctrine, "the right to govern rests on the consent of the
governed," and to the right of independent action as among those
reserved by the States. The South appealed to the acts and
opinions of the Fathers and to the report of the Hartford
Convention of New England States asserting the power of each
State to decide as to the remedy for infraction of its rights; to the
petitions

presented and positions assumed by ex-President John Quincy
Adams; to the contemporaneous declaration of the 8th of January
assemblage in Ohio indicating that 200,000 Democrats in that
State alone were ready to stand guard on the banks of the border
river and resist invasion of Southern territory; and to the repeated
declarations of Horace Greeley and the admission of President
Lincoln himself that there was difficulty on the question of force,
since ours ought to be a fraternal Government.

In answer to all these points, the North also cited the acts and
opinions of the same Fathers, and urged that the purpose of
those Fathers was to make a more perfect Union and a stronger
government. The North offset the opinions of Greeley and others
by the emphatic declaration of Stephen A. Douglas, the foremost
of Western Democrats, and by the official opinion as to the
power of the Government to collect revenues and enforce laws,
given to President Buchanan by Jere Black, the able Democratic
Attorney-General.

Thus the opposing arguments drawn from current opinions and
from the actions and opinions of the Fathers were piled mountain
high on both sides. Thus the mighty athletes of debate wrestled
in the political arena, each profoundly convinced of the
righteousness of his position; hurling at each other their ponderous
arguments, which reverberated like angry thunderbolts through
legislative halls, until the whole political atmosphere resounded
with the tumult. Long before a single gun was fired public
sentiment North and South had been lashed into a foaming sea of
passion; and every
timber in the framework of the Government was ending and
ready to break from "the heaving ground-swell of the
tremendous agitation." Gradually and naturally in this furnace of
sectional debate, sectional ballots were crystallized into sectional
bullets; and both sides came

at last to the position formerly held by the great Troup of
Georgia: "The argument is exhausted; we stand to our guns."

I submit that this brief and incomplete summary is sufficient to
satisfy those who live after us that these great leaders of
conflicting thought, and their followers who continued the debate in
battle and blood, while in some sense partisans, were in a far
juster sense patriots.

The opinions of Lee and Grant, from each of whom I briefly
quote, will illustrate in a measure the convictions of their armies.
Every Confederate appreciates the magnanimity exhibited by
General Grant at Appomattox; and it has been my pleasure for
nearly forty years to speak in public and private of his great
qualities. In his personal memoirs, General Grant has left on
record his estimate of the Southern cause. This estimate
represents a strong phase of Northern sentiment, but it is a
sentiment which it is extremely difficult for a Southern man to
comprehend. In speaking of his feelings as "sad and depressed,"
as he rode to meet General Lee and receive the surrender of the
Southern armies at Appomattox, General Grant says: "I felt like
anything rather than rejoicing at the downfall of a foe who had
fought so long and valiantly, and who had suffered so much for a
cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for
which a people ever fought, and one for which there was the
least excuse." He adds: "I do not question, however, the
sincerity of the great mass of those who were opposed to us."

The words above quoted, showing General Grant's opinion of
the Southern cause, are italicized by me and not by him. My
object in emphasizing them is to invite special attention to their
marked contrast with the opinions of General Robert E. Lee as
to that same Southern cause. This peerless Confederate soldier
and representative American, than whom no age or country

ever produced a loftier spirit or more clear-sighted,
conscientious Christian gentleman, in referring, two days before
the surrender, to the apparent hopelessness of our cause, used
these immortal words: "We had, I was satisfied, sacred
principles to maintain and rights to defend for which we
were in duty bound to do our best, even if we perished in the
endeavor."

There were those, a few years ago, who were especially
devoted to the somewhat stereotyped phrase that in our Civil
War one side (meaning the North) "was wholly and eternally
right," while the other side (meaning the South) "was wholly and
eternally wrong." I might cite those on the Southern side of the
great controversy, equally sincere and fully as able, who would
have been glad to persuade posterity that the North was "wholly
and eternally wrong"; that her people waged war upon sister
States who sought peacefully to set up a homogeneous
government, and meditated no wrong or warfare upon the
remaining sister States. These Southern leaders steadfastly
maintained that the Southern people, in the exercise of the
freedom and sovereign rights purchased by Revolutionary blood,
were asserting a second independence according to the
teachings and example of their fathers.

But what good is to come to the country from partisan
utterances on either side? My own well-considered and
long-entertained opinion, my settled and profound conviction, the
correctness of which the future will vindicate, is this: that the
one thing which is "wholly and eternally wrong" is the effort of
so-called statesmen to inject one-sided and jaundiced sentiments
into the youth of the country in either section. Such sentiments
are neither consistent with the truth of history, nor conducive to
the future welfare and unity of the Republic. The assumption on
either side of all the righteousness and all the truth would
produce a belittling arrogance,

and an offensive intolerance of the opposing section; or, if either
section could be persuaded that it was "wholly and eternally
wrong," it would inevitably destroy the self-respect and manhood
of its people. A far broader, more truthful, and statesmanlike
view was presented by the Hon. A. E. Stevenson, of Illinois,
then Vice-President of the United States, in his opening remarks
as presiding officer at the dedication of the National Park at
Chickamauga. In perfect accord with the sentiment of the
occasion and the spirit which led to the establishment of this
park as a bond of national brotherhood, Mr. Stevenson said:
"Here, in the dread tribunal of last resort, valor contended against
valor. Here brave men struggled and died for the right as God
gave them to see the right."

Mr. Stevenson was right--"wholly and eternally right." Truth,
justice, and patriotism unite in proclaiming that both sides fought
and suffered for liberty as bequeathed by the Fathers--the one
for liberty in the union of the States, the other for liberty in the
independence of the States.

While the object of these papers is to record my personal
reminiscences and to perpetuate incidents illustrative of the
character of the American soldier, whether he fought on the one
side or the other, I am also moved to write by what I conceive
to be a still higher aim; and that is to point out, if I can, the
common ground on which all may stand; where justification of
one section does not require or imply condemnation of the
other--the broad, high, sunlit middle ground where fact meets fact,
argument confronts argument, and truth is balanced against
truth.

CHAPTER II

THE TRIP FROM CORINTH

The Raccoon Roughs made a part of the Sixth Alabama--The journey to
Virginia--Families divided in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri--A father
captured by a son in battle--The military spirit in Virginia--Andrew
Johnson and Parson Brownlow Union leaders in Tennessee--Johnson's narrowness
afterward exhibited as President.

THE Raccoon Roughs made an imposing twelfth part of the
Sixth Alabama, which was one of the largest regiments in the
Confederate army. Governor Moore, in order to comply with his
promise to incorporate my company into one of the first
regiments to be organized, consented that the Sixth should
contain twelve instead of the regulation number of ten
companies. A movement had been started in Atlanta to uniform
my mountaineers: but when the message was received from
Governor Moore, inviting us to come to Montgomery, all thought
of uniformity in dress was lost in the enthusiasm evoked by the
knowledge that our services were accepted; and even after the
hastily prepared uniforms were issued by the new Government
my company clung tenaciously to "coonskin" head-dress, which
made a striking contrast to the gray caps worn by the other
companies.

No regulation uniform had at this time been adopted for field
officers, and in deference to the wishes and the somewhat
quaint taste of Colonel Seibles, the regimental commander, the
mounted officers of the Sixth wore double-breasted

frock-coats made of green broadcloth, with the brass
buttons of the United States army. These green coats--more
suited to Irishmen than to Americans--were not discarded during
the entire term of our first enlistment for twelve months, nor until
we were enrolled as a part of the army that was to serve until
Southern independence was won or lost. I do not know what became of
my bottle-green coat, with the bullet-holes through it, which
would now be an object of interest to my children. It is
remarkable that during the war no care was taken of any of
these battle-marked articles. All minds and hearts were
absorbed in the one thought of defence. It was a long time
before even the flags borne in battle became objects of special
veneration, or gathered about them the sentiment which grew
into a passion as the war neared its close. After one of the early
battles one of my color-bearers had secured and fastened to the
staff a beautiful new flag. When I asked him what he had done
with the old one, he replied:

"I threw it away, sir. It was so badly shot that it was not
worth keeping."

Our departure from Montgomery for Corinth, Mississippi,
where we were to go into camp of instruction for an indefinite
period, was amid the roar of cannon, the shouts of the multitude,
the waving of flags and handkerchiefs, and the prayers and
tears of mothers, wives, and sisters. The encampment at Corinth
was brief and uneventful; but our trip thence to Virginia was
intensely interesting, because of the danger and threat of conflict
between my troops and the citizens in certain localities. The line
of our travel was through East Tennessee, where, even at that
early period, there were evidences of the radical conflict of
opinion between neighbors which was destined to eventuate in
many bloody feuds. At the depots crowds of men were
gathered, some cheering, some jeering, my troops as they
passed. From the tops

of houses on one side of the street floated the Stars and Stripes;
from those on the other were ensigns showing sympathy with
the new-born Confederacy. The responsibility on my shoulders
was not a light one, for it was my duty on every account to
restrain the ardor of my own men and prevent the slightest
imprudence of speech or action. No other locality approached
East Tennessee in the extent of suffering from this peculiarly
harassing sort of strife, unless possibly it was the State of
Kentucky. In both public sentiment was divided. There was
intense loyalty to the Union on the one hand, and to the
Confederate cause on the other.

War's visage is grim enough at best; and to the people of
those localities which were constantly subjected to raids, first by
one side and then by the other, its frowning face was rarely
relieved by one gleam of alleviating tenderness. These divided
communities were the fated grist which the demon of border
war seemed determined to grind to dust between his upper and
nether millstones.

In East Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri, neighbors who had
been lifelong friends became extremely embittered. Families were
divided, brother against brother, and father against son. In
Kentucky, it will be remembered, many of the most prominent
families of the State, among them the Breckinridges, the Clays,
and the Crittendens, were represented in both the Confederate
and Union armies. John C. Breckinridge, who had just left the
seat of Vice-President of the United States, and who had been
the candidate of one wing of the Democratic party for President,
cast his fortunes with the South, and made a brilliant record as a
soldier and as the last Confederate Secretary of War. Other
members of this distinguished family filled honorable
positions in the opposing armies, and the distinguished and
somewhat eccentric divine, the Rev. Robert J. Breckinridge,

was one of the most eloquent and fervid--not to say bitter--
advocates of the Union cause. His trenchant pen and lashing
tongue spared neither blood relatives nor ministers nor members
of the church, not even those of the same faith with himself,
provided he regarded them as untrue to the Union. The intensity
of Dr. Breckinridge's antagonism showed itself even on his death-bed.
He and the Rev. Dr. Stuart Robinson, of Kentucky, were
both eminent ministers of the same church, Dr. Robinson being
as intense a sympathizer with the South as Dr. Breckinridge was
with the North. From devoted friends they became fierce
antagonists and uncompromising foes. When Dr. Breckinridge
lay on his death-bed, his family and some of his church-members
were gathered around him. They were most anxious that he
should be reconciled to all men, and especially to Dr. Robinson,
before he died, and they asked him,
"Brother Breckinridge, have you forgiven all your enemies?"

"Certainly I have. Didn't I just tell you that I had forgiven all
my enemies?"

"But, Brother Breckinridge, when you meet Brother Stuart
Robinson in heaven, do you feel that you can greet him as all the
redeemed ought to greet one another?"

"Don't bother me with such questions. Stuart Robinson will
never get there!"

During the year 1895 I was honored with an invitation to
address an audience in Maysville, Kentucky. I was deeply
impressed by the fact conveyed to me that a large number of
those who sat before me had the harmony and happiness of their
homes destroyed for the four years of war by the inexpressibly
horrid

thought that sons of the same parents were pitted against each
other in battle. I was personally presented to a number of these
formerly divided brothers who had bravely fought from the
beginning to the end in opposing lines, but were now reunited
under the old family roof and in the common Republic. It was a
Kentucky father, I believe, both of whose sons had been killed in
battle, the one in the Confederate, the other in the Union army,
who erected to the memory of both over their common grave
the monument on which he had inscribed these five
monosyllables: "God knows which was right."

So much has been said and written of the peculiar trials and
horrors experienced by the divided communities in Missouri, East
Tennessee, and Kentucky that it is a privilege to record one of
the incidents which at rare intervals sent rays of light through
those unhappy localities. Major Edwards, of the Confederate
army, who afterward became an editor of distinction in Missouri,
had, at the beginning of the war, a neighbor and friend who was
as intense a Unionist as the major was an enthusiastic
Confederate. Each felt it his duty to go into the service, and
when the war came they parted to take their places in opposing
battle lines. Later on, Major Edwards captured this former
neighbor and friend behind the Southern lines, and near their
Missouri home. In reply to the question as to why he had taken
such risk of being captured and sent to a Southern prison, the
Union soldier explained that his wife was behind those lines and
extremely ill--probably dying; that he had taken the risk of slipping
at night, between the Confederate picket posts in order to
receive her last blessing and embrace. This statement was
enough for the knightly man in gray. The Union soldier was at
once made a prisoner, but only in the bonds of brotherly
tenderness. His house was carefully guarded by Major Edwards
himself until the sad parting with his

wife was over, and then he was safely conducted through the
Confederate lines and sent with a Confederate's sympathy to his
post of duty in the Union camps.

At a recent reunion of the United Confederate Veterans, I
was told of a thrilling incident which still further and more
strikingly illustrates the tragedy of war in these divided States. At
the beginning of the war Major M. H. Clift, of Tennessee, was a
mere lad, and was attending school in another State. His father
was an East Tennesseean and was devoted to the cause of the
Union. Young Clift, however, was carried away by the storm of
Southern enthusiasm and joined the Confederate army. The
father soon yielded to his own sense of patriotic duty, and
enlisted in one of the Union regiments formed in the
neighborhood. In the fortunes of war, the two, father and son,
were soon called to confront each other under hostile banners
and in battle array. Neither had the remotest thought that the
other stood in his front. In a furious charge by the Southern lines
this young Confederate forced a Union soldier to surrender to
him. Looking into the captured soldier's face, the young man
recognized his own father. No pen could adequately depict his
consternation when he realized that he had been on the point of
killing his father, nor the joy which filled his heart that this dire
calamity had been averted. Steps were at once taken to render it
certain that no such contingency should again occur.

But the horrors of family division were not confined to these
States. There were conspicuous instances elsewhere of the
disruption of the most sacred ties. The Virginia kindred of that
able soldier General George H. Thomas, and of ex-President
Harrison, were in the Confederate service, while those of
Generals Lovell and Pemberton, who fought for the Southern
cause, and of Mrs. General Longstreet, supported the flag of the
Union.

her husband retreat from Savannah under the Confederate
commander, while her own dearly loved kindred marched into
the town under General W. T. Sherman. This wife was Nellie
Kinsey, said to be the first white child born in Chicago. She grew
to accomplished womanhood, and married William W. Gordon of
Savannah, who made a brilliant record as a Confederate officer,
and during our recent war with Spain was commissioned
brigadier-general by President McKinley. Mrs. Gordon was
intensely loyal to her husband and to the cause he loved, but her
kindred--her only kindred--were in the Union army and
conspicuous for their gallantry in almost every arm of the
service. As she stood with her children watching the Federal
troops march in triumphant array under the windows of her
Southern home, a splendid brass band at the head of one of the
divisions began playing that familiar old air, "When this Cruel
War is Over." As soon as the notes struck the ears of her little
daughter, this enthusiastic young Confederate exclaimed,
"Mamma, just listen to the Yankees playing 'When this Cruel War is Over,' and
they just doing it themselves!"

When we reached Virginia the military spirit was in full flood-tide.
The State had just passed the ordinance of secession, and
almost every young and middle-aged man was volunteering for
service. Even the servants were becoming interested in the
military positions to which the aspiring young men of the
household might be assigned. I recall an incident so strikingly
characteristic that it seems due to a proper appreciation of these
old-time loyal and faithful slaves that I give it in this connection.

Old Simon was the trusted and devoted butler of a leading
Virginia family, and was very proud of his young master, who
had just enlisted as a private in the cavalry, and, dressed in his
new uniform and mounted

upon his blooded horse, was drilling every day with his
company. He was, in old Simon's estimation, the equal, if not the
superior, of any soldier that was ever booted and spurred. The
time came for the company to start
to the front, and one of them rode up and asked old Simon:

"Is Bob here, Simon, or has he gone to camp?"

"Is you talking about my young marster, Colonel Robert?"

"Yes; of course I am, Simon," replied the trooper.
"But I should like to know how in the - - - Bob got to be a colonel?"

"Lawd, sir, he 's des born a colonel!" said Simon; and his
genuine and unaffected pride in this belief
flashed in his old eyes and rang in his tones.

No account of East Tennessee's condition and experiences at
this period would be complete without a few
words in reference to those impetuous East Tennessee Union
leaders, Andrew Johnson, who afterward became President, and
the redoubtable Parson Brownlow, whose fiery denunciations of
the Southern cause filled the columns of his paper, "Brownlow's
Whig." Lifelong political antagonists, the one a Democrat, the
other a Whig, and both aggressive and unrelenting, they nevertheless,
when civil war approached, buried the partisan tomahawk and
wielded the Union battle-axe side by side. They became
coadjutors and the most powerful civil
supporters of the Union cause in the State, if not in the South.
Andrew Johnson, as is well known, was a tailor when a young
man, and, it is said, was taught to read by his faithful wife. He
deserved and received immense credit for the laborious study
and untiring perseverance which converted the scissors of his
shop into the sceptre of Chief Executive of the world's greatest
Republic; but
he did not broaden in sentiment in proportion to the elevation
he attained and the gravity of the responsibilities

imposed. He was strong but narrow. He could not be a
statesman in the highest sense of that term, because he was
swayed by prejudice more than by lofty convictions. That he was
impelled by motives intensely patriotic in adhering to the Union
there can be no reasonable doubt; but his utter failure to rise to a
full conception of the situation in which he found himself after
President Lincoln's unfortunate death was painfully apparent to
every thoughtful observer. His intolerant bigotry, and his failure to
appreciate the obligations imposed upon him by General Grant's
magnanimous and solemn compact with the Southern army at
Appomattox, were manifested by his desire to arrest General Lee
and other prominent prisoners of war who had protecting paroles.
His blind prejudice against our best people was shown in his
selection of classes for amnesty; and the low plane on which he
planted his administration was evidenced by his inconsistencies, his
vacillations, and his reversal of the wise, generous, and
statesmanly policy of his great predecessor. But the narrowness
of the man and the amazing absurdity of his prejudice are
sufficiently exhibited in a circumstance trivial in itself, but which,
perhaps on that account, more clearly indicates his calibre. A few
months after the war was over, I was passing through
Washington, and called to pay my respects to General Grant, who
had shown me personally, at the close of hostilities, marked
consideration and kindness, of which I shall make mention in
another chapter. General Grant offered to introduce me to
President Johnson, whom I had never met. We walked across to
the Executive Mansion, and General Grant gave the usher a card
on which was written, "General Grant, with General Gordon of
Georgia," with instructions to the usher to hand it to the President.
We were at once admitted to his presence, and I was introduced
by General Grant as "General Gordon," with

some complimentary reference to my rank and service in
General Lee's army. The President met this introduction by
these words, pronounced with peculiar emphasis, "How are you,
Mr. Gordon?" especially accentuating the word Mister. I was neither angry nor
indignant, but
my contempt was sincere for the ineffable littleness of the man
whose untimely ascendancy to
power at that critical period I can but regard as the veriest
mockery of fate.

Contrast this foolish and abortive effort at insult with the
conduct of President Grant, who succeeded him, or of General
Grant as soldier, or with that of any other
prominent soldier or high-minded citizen of the country. The
conduct of General Hancock at General Grant's funeral in New
York is perhaps in still greater contrast
with that of President Johnson. Although the incident I am about
to relate is chronologically out of place here,
it is emphatically in place as illustrating the point I am making in
reference to President Johnson.

It will be remembered that General Hancock was
commander of the Department of the East (United States army)
at the time of General Grant's death, and was, by reason of his
military rank, the chief marshal of that stupendous and most
impressive pageant witnessed in New York at General Grant's
obsequies. I was included among those ex-Confederate officers
who had been specially invited to participate in the honors to be paid
to the dead soldier and former President. General Hancock had
requested that I should ride with him at the head of the mighty
procession, and he had
playfully said to the staff that each of us should take his place
according to rank. Of course I had no thought of claiming any
rank, and I took my place in the rear of the regular staff.
General Hancock sent one after an other of his immediate staff
to request me to ride up to the front, with the message that I
must obey orders and

report to him at once at the head of the column. When I reached
the head of the column, General Hancock directed the staff to
compare dates and ascertain the ranking officer who should ride
on his right. My rank as a Confederate general was higher than
that of any other member of his staff, and he ordered that I
should take the place of honor. As I could not gracefully resist
this assignment any longer, I accepted it, saying to the Union
generals, who also served on General Hancock's staff, that they
had overwhelmed me some twenty-odd years before, but that I
had them down now. General Fitzhugh Lee was similarly
honored.

In closing this chapter, it is not necessary, I trust, for me to say
that I would do no injustice to the memory of President Johnson,
but it seems to me that the future manhood of our country can be
ennobled by the contemplation of the marked and notable
contrasts here presented, and by a realization of the truth that no
station in life, however conspicuous, can conceal from view the
weakness of its possessor. Certainly it can inflict no damage
upon the character of our youth to let them understand that the
gulf is both broad and deep which separates the highest type of
courage from petty and ignoble spite, and that the line which
divides true nobility of soul from narrowness of spirit was drawn
by God's hand, and will become clearer to human apprehension
as we approach nearer to Him in thought and action.

CHAPTER III

BULL RUN OR MANASSAS

The first great battle of the war--A series of surprises--Mishaps and
mistakes of the Confederates--Beauregard's lost order--General Ewell's
rage--The most eccentric officer in the Confederate army--Anecdotes of his
career--The wild panic of the Union troops--Senseless frights that cannot
be explained-- Illustrated at Cedar Creek.

THE battle of Bull Run or Manassas was the first, and in many
respects the most remarkable, battle of our Civil War. It was a
series of surprises--the unexpected happening at almost every
moment of its progress. Planned by the Union chieftain with
consummate skill, executed for the most part with unquestioned
ability, and fought by the Union troops for a time with
magnificent courage, it ended at last in their disastrous rout and
the official decapitation of their able commander. On the
Confederate side it was a chapter of mishaps, miscarriages, and
of some mistakes. It was also a chapter of superb fighting by the
Southern army, and of final complete and overwhelming victory.
The breaking down of the train bearing General Joseph E.
Johnston's troops was an accident which almost defeated the
consummation of that splendid piece of strategy by which he had
eluded General Patterson in the Valley, and which had enabled
him to hurry almost his entire force to the support of General
Beauregard at Manassas. The mistakes are represented by the
fact that the feint of General McDowell on the Confederate front
was believed

to be the real attack, until the Union general was hurling his
army on Beauregard's flank. Finally, the most serious
miscarriage was that the order from Beauregard to Ewell
directing an assault on the Union left failed to reach that officer.
This strange miscarriage prevented General Ewell from making a
movement which it then seemed probable and now appears
certain would have added materially to McDowell's disaster. I
had already been instructed by him to make a reconnaissance in
the direction of the anticipated assault, but I had been suddenly
recalled just as my skirmishers were opening fire. I was recalled
because General Ewell had not received the promised order. For
me it was perhaps a most fortunate recall, for in my isolated
position I should probably have been surrounded and my little
command cut to pieces. On my return I found General Ewell in
an agony of suspense. He was chafing like a caged lion,
infuriated by the scent of blood. He would mount his horse one
moment and dismount the next. He would walk rapidly to and fro,
muttering to himself, "No orders, no orders." General Ewell, who
afterward became a corps commander, had in many respects the
most unique personality I have ever known. He was a compound
of anomalies, the oddest, most eccentric genius in the
Confederate army. He was my friend, and I was sincerely and
deeply attached to him. No man had a better heart nor a worse
manner of showing it. He was in truth as tender and sympathetic
as a woman, but, even under slight provocation, he became
externally as rough as a polar bear, and the needles with which
he pricked sensibilities were more numerous and keener than
porcupines' quills. His written orders were full, accurate, and
lucid; but his verbal orders or directions, especially when under
intense excitement, no man could comprehend. At such times his
eyes would flash with a peculiar brilliancy, and his brain far
outran his tongue.

His thoughts would leap across great gaps which his words
never touched, but which he expected his listener to fill up by
intuition, and woe to the dull subordinate who failed to
understand him!

When he was first assigned to command at the beginning of
the war, he had recently returned from fighting Indians on the
Western frontier. He had been dealing only with the enlisted men
of the standing army. His experience in that wild border life,
away from churches, civilization, and the refining influences of
woman's society, were not particularly conducive to the
development of the softer and better side of his nature. He
became a very pious man in his later years, but at this time he
was not choice in the manner of expressing himself. He asked
me to take a hasty breakfast with him just before he expected
the order from Beauregard to ford Bull Run and rush upon
McDowell's left. His verbal invitation was in these words:
"Come and eat a cracker with me; we will breakfast together
here and dine together in hell." To a young officer like myself,
who had never been under fire except at long range, on scouting
excursions, or on the skirmish-line, such an invitation was not
inspiring or appetizing; but Ewell's spirits seemed to be in a flutter
of exultation.

An hour later, after I had been recalled from my perilous
movement to "feel of the enemy," I found General Ewell, as I
have said, almost frenzied with anxiety over the non-arrival of
the anticipated order to move to the attack. He directed me to
send to him at once a mounted man "with sense enough to go
and find out what was the matter." I ordered a member of the
governor's Horse Guard to report immediately to General Ewell.
This troop represented some of the best blood of Virginia. Its
privates were refined and accomplished gentlemen, many of
them University graduates, who, at the first tocsin of war, had
sprung into their saddles as volunteers.

The intelligent young trooper who was selected to ride upon
this most important mission under the verbal direction of General
Ewell himself, mounted his high-spirited horse, and, with high-top
boots, polished spurs, and clanking sabre, galloped away to where
the general was impatiently waiting at his temporary headquarters
on the hill. Before this inexperienced but promising young soldier
had time to lift his hat in respectful salutation, the general was
slashing away with tongue and finger, delivering his directions with
such rapidity and incompleteness that the young man's thoughts
were dancing through his brain in inextricable confusion. The
general, having thus delivered himself, quickly asked, "Do you
understand, sir?" Of course the young man did not understand, and
he began timidly to ask for a little more explicit information. The
fiery old soldier cut short the interview with "Go away from here
and send me a man who has some sense!"

Later in the war, when I was commanding a division in
Stonewall Jackson's old corps, then commanded by General
Ewell, I had a very similar experience with this eccentric officer.
It was in the midst of one of the battles between Lee and Grant
in the Wilderness. As already explained, General Ewell's spirits,
like the eagle's wings gathering additional power in the storm,
seemed to mount higher and higher as the fury of the battle
increased. My division of his corps was advancing under a
galling fire. General Ewell rode at full speed to the point where I
was intensely engaged directing the charge, and asked me to
lend him one of my staff, his own all having been despatched
with orders to different portions of the field. I indicated a staff-officer
whom he might command, and he began, in his
characteristic style under excitement, to tell this officer what to
do. My staff-officer had learned to interpret the general fairly
well, but

to catch his meaning at one point stopped him and said: "Let me
see if I understand you, sir?" General Ewell was so incensed at
this insinuation of lack of perspicuity that he turned away
abruptly, without a word of explanation simply throwing up his
hand and blowing away the young officer with a sort of
"whoo-oo-oot." There is no way to spell out this indignant and
resounding puff; but even in the fierce battle that was raging
there was a roar of laughter from the other members of my staff
as the droll and doughty warrior rushed away to another part of
the field.

I cannot conclude this imperfect portrayal of the peculiarities
of this splendid soldier and eccentric genius without placing upon
record one more incident connected with the first battle of Bull
Run. While he waited for the order from Beauregard (which
never came), I sat on my horse near him as he was directing the
location of a battery to cover the ford, and fire upon a Union
battery and its supports on the opposite hills. As our guns were
unlimbered, a young lady, who had been caught between the
lines of the two armies, galloped up to where the general and I
were sitting on our horses, and began to tell the story of what
she had seen. She had mounted her horse just in front of General
McDowell's troops, who it was expected would attempt to force
a crossing at this point. This Virginia girl, who appeared to be
seventeen or eighteen years of age, was in a flutter of martial
excitement. She was profoundly impressed with the belief that
she really had something of importance to tell. The information
which she was trying to convey to General Ewell she was sure
would be of vast import to the Confederate cause, and she was
bound to deliver it. General Ewell listened to her for a few
minutes, and then called her attention to the Union batteries that
were rushing into position and getting ready to open fire upon the
Confederate lines. He said to her, in

his quick, quaint manner: "Look there, look there, miss! Don't
you see those men with blue clothes on, in the edge of the
woods? Look at those men loading those big guns. They are
going to fire, and fire quick, and fire right here. You 'll get killed.
You 'll be a dead damsel in less than a minute. Get away from
here! Get away!" The young woman looked over at the blue
coats and the big guns, but paid not the slightest attention to
either. Nor did she make any reply to his urgent injunction, "Get
away from here!" but continued the story of what she had seen.
General Ewell, who was a crusty old bachelor at that time, and
knew far less about women than he did about wild Indians, was
astounded at this exhibition of feminine courage. He gazed at her
in mute wonder for a few minutes, and then turned to me
suddenly, and, with a sort of jerk in his words, said: "Women--I
tell you, sir, women would make a grand brigade--if it was not for
snakes and spiders!" He then added much more thoughtfully:
"They don't mind bullets--women are not afraid of bullets; but one
big black-snake would put a whole army to flight." And he had
not fired very wide of the mark. It requires the direst dangers,
especially where those dangers threaten some cause or object
around which their affections are entwined, to call out the
marvellous courage of women. Under such conditions they will
brave death itself without a quiver. I have seen one of them
tested. I saw Mrs. Gordon on the streets of Winchester, under
fire, her soul aflame with patriotic ardor, appealing to retreating
Confederates to halt and form a new line to resist the Union
advance. She was so transported by her patriotic passion that she
took no notice of the whizzing shot and shell, and seemed wholly
unconscious of her great peril. And yet she will precipitately fly
from a bat, and a big black bug would fill her with panic.

Those who are inclined to investigate the mysteries of that
strange compound which makes up our mental, moral, and
physical natures will find abundant material in the wild panic
which seized and shook to pieces the Union army at Bull Run,
scattering it in disorganized fragments through woods and fields
and by-ways, and filling the roads with broken wagons and
knapsacks, and small arms--an astounding experience which
was the prototype of similar scenes to be enacted in both armies
in the later stages of the war. No better troops were ever
marshalled than those who filled the Union and Confederate
ranks. Indeed, taking them all in all, I doubt whether they have
been equalled. How courage of the noblest type, such as these
American soldiers possessed, could be converted in an instant
into apparent--even apparent--cowardice is one of the secrets,
unsolvable perhaps, of our being. What was the special,
sufficient, and justifiable ground for such uncontrollable
apprehensions in men who enlisted to meet death, and did meet
it, or were ready to meet it, bravely and grandly on a hundred
fields? The panic at Bull Run seized McDowell's whole army;
and yet a large portion of it at the moment the panic occurred
was perhaps not under fire--certainly in no danger of annihilation
or of serious harm. Yet they fled, all or practically all--fled with
uncontrollable terror. Of course there were times when it was
necessary to retreat. Occasions came, I presume, to every
command that did much fighting during those four years, when
the most sensible thing to do was to go, and without much
thought as to the order of the going--the faster the better. It is not
that class of retreats that I am considering. These were not
panics; nor did they bear any special resemblance to panics,
except that in both cases it was flight--even disorganized flight.
There was, however, this radical difference between the two: in
one

case the men were ready to halt, reform their lines, and fight
again; in the other case these same men were as heedless of an
officer's orders (supposing the officer to have retained his
senses) as a herd of wild buffaloes.

The soldiers on both sides who may read this book will recall
many instances of both kinds of flight. One of the good-natured
gibes with which the infantry poked the ribs of the cavalry was
that they had too many feet and legs under them to stand and be
shot at; but what old soldier of either arm of the service will
refuse to bear testimony to the fact that the Confederate cavalry
on many occasions charged batteries and solid lines, and, after
being repulsed, would retreat, reform, and charge again and
again--a constant alternation of charges and rapid retreats
without the slightest indication of panic? I saw Sheridan's
cavalry in the Valley of Virginia form in my front, charge across
the open fields and almost over my lines, which were posted
behind stone fences. They rode at a furious rate, driving spurs
into their horses' sides as they rushed like a mountain torrent
against the rock wall. Some of them went over it, only to be
captured or shot. They discharged carbines in our faces, and
then retreated in fairly good order, under a furious fire, with
apparently no more of panic than if they had been fighting a
sham battle.

But those sudden and sometimes senseless frights which
deprived brave men of all self-control for the time, were so
unexpected, so strange and terrible, so inconsistent with the
conduct of the same men at other times and under
circumstances equally and perhaps even more trying, that they
justify a few additional illustrations.

The battle of Cedar Creek in the Shenandoah Valley, on
October 19, 1864, about which I shall have more to say in its
chronological order, furnishes cases in

point by both armies and on the same day. Neither the panic
which struck with such resistless terror, Sheridan's two corps as
they were assaulted at dawn, and which sent them, as the sun
rose over the adjacent mountains, flying in wildest rout from the
fields and for miles to the rear, with no enemy in pursuit; nor the
panic which seized and sent General Early's army, as that same
sun was setting behind the opposite mountains, rushing across
the bridges, or into the chilly waters, and through the dense
cedars of the limestone cliffs--neither of these was the
necessary, logical, or even natural sequence of the conditions
which preceded them. There is no logic in a panic. It is true that
in both cases the armies had been assailed in front and flank;
and the cry, "We are flanked!" not infrequently produced upon
the steadiest battalions an effect similar to that caused among
passengers at sea by the alarm of fire. But the point is that while
it might not have been possible to prevent the opposing forces
from achieving a victory after the flank movement was under
full headway, yet the retreat in each case could have been
accomplished with far lighter losses in killed, wounded, and
prisoners. If the armies had not allowed the unnecessary panic
to deprive them of their reason and thus of all control of will
power, they would have had a better chance for life in a
somewhat orderly retreat, distracting and confusing the aim of
the advancing lines by returning fire for fire, than by permitting
the pursuers deliberately to shoot them in the back.

The strangest fact of all is that many of these men in both
armies had often exhibited before, as they did on many
succeeding fields and under just as trying conditions, a heroism
rarely equalled and never excelled in military annals--a
heroism that defied danger and was impervious to panic.
Sheridan's men, who threw away everything that could impede
their flight in the morning

at Cedar Creek, fought with splendid courage before and
afterward. Indeed, they returned that same afternoon and made
most honorable amends for the mistakes of the morning. Some
of these same Confederates had been flanked and almost
surrounded by McDowell's army in the early hours at Bull Run
and yet felt no symptoms of panic. Some of them had been with
me at South Mountain in '62, detached for the moment from the
main army, at times nearly surrounded, attacked first in front,
then upon the right, and then upon the left flank, changing front
under fire, retreating now slowly, now rapidly, but in every case
halting at the command and forming a new line to repeat the
manoeuvres, and without a semblance of panic. I verily believe
they would have died, almost to a man, on the rocks of that
rugged mountain-side, but for the gracious dropping of night's
curtain on the scene. They did die, nearly or quite half of them,
the next day at Antietam or Sharpsburg. Still more striking the
contrast--large numbers of these Confederates who were
overwhelmed with panic at Cedar Creek fought upon the last
dreadful retreat from Petersburg with marvellous intrepidity,
while flanked and forced to move rapidly from one position to
another. And on that last morning at Appomattox these same
Confederates were fighting in almost every direction, surrounded
on all sides except one, with a column plainly in view and
advancing to complete the circle of fire around them; and they
continued to fight
bravely and grandly until the flag of truce heralded the
announcement that the war was over.

CHAPTER IV

THE SPRING OF 1862--BATTLE OF SEVEN PINES OR
FAIR OAKS

Indomitable Americanism, North and South--Rally of the North after
Bull Run--Severity of winter quarters in Virginia--McClellan's army landed
at Yorktown--Retreat of the Confederates--On the Chickahominy--Terrible
slaughter at Seven Pines--A brigade commander.

THE North had lost, the South had won, in the first bloody battle
of the war, and all chances for compromise were obliterated, if
indeed they had ever existed. The Northern army had been
defeated and driven back beyond the Potomac, but the defeat
simply served to arouse the patriotic people of that section to
more determined effort. Party passion was buried, party lines
were almost entirely erased, and party organizations were
merged into the one compact body of a united people, led by the
all-pervading purpose to crush out the Southern movement and
save the Union. With that tenacity of will, that unyielding
Anglo-Saxon perseverance--or, I prefer to say, that indomitable
Americanism--for which the people of the United States are so
justly famed, the North rose superior to the disaster, and
resolved, as did old Andrew Jackson, that "the Union should be
preserved."

The South, on the other hand, greatly encouraged by the
victory, bowed at its altars and thanked Heaven for this
indication of ultimate triumph. Her whole people, with an equally
tenacious Americanism, and fully persuaded

that the independent States, now united under another
and similar Constitution, had a right to set up their own
homogeneous government, resolved that, if sacrifices and
fighting could secure it, the South should become an independent
republic. With a deeper consecration than ever, if possible, they
pledged anew to that cause their honor, their wealth, their faith,
their prayers, their lofty manhood and glorious womanhood,
resolving never to yield as long as hope or life endured. And they
did not yield until their whole section, "with its resources all
exhausted, lay prostrate and powerless, bleeding at every pore."

The North soon rallied after the defeat at Bull Run. Her
armies were placed under the immediate command of that
brilliant young chieftain, George B. McClellan, whose genius as
organizer, ability as disciplinarian, and magnetism in contact with
his men, rapidly advanced his heavily reënforced army to a high
plane of efficiency. The pride felt in him was manifested by the
title "Young Napoleon," bestowed upon him by his admiring
countrymen. No advance, however, was made by his army until
the following spring. The Confederate army, under General
Joseph E. Johnston, was occupied during the remaining months
of summer and fall, mainly in drilling, recruiting its ranks, doing
picket duty, and, as winter approached, in gathering supplies and
preparing, as far as possible, for protection against Virginia
freezes and snows.

My men were winter-quartered in the dense pine thickets on
the rough hills that border the Occoquan. Christmas came, and
was to be made as joyous as our surroundings would permit, by a
genuine Southern eggnog with our friends. The country was
scoured far and near for eggs, which were exceedingly scarce.
Of sugar we still had at that time a reasonable supply, but our
small store of eggs and the other ingredients could not

be increased in all the country round about. Mrs. Gordon
superintended the preparation of this favorite Christmas
beverage, and at last the delicious potion was ready. All stood
anxiously waiting with camp cups in hand. The servant started
toward the company with full and foaming bowl, holding it out
before him with almost painful care. He had taken but a few
steps when he struck his toe against the uneven floor of the rude
quarters and stumbled. The scattered fragments of crockery and
the aroma of the wasted nectar marked the melancholy wreck of
our Christmas cheer.

The winter was a severe one and the men suffered
greatly--not only for want of sufficient preparation, but
because those from farther South were unaccustomed
to so cold a climate. There was much sickness in camp.
It was amazing to see the large number of country boys
who had never had the measles. Indeed, it seemed to
me that they ran through the whole catalogue of complaints
to which boyhood and even babyhood are subjected.
They had everything almost except teething,
nettle-rash, and whooping-cough. I rather think some of
them were afflicted with this latter disease. Those who
are disposed to wonder that Southern troops should
suffer so much from a Virginia winter will better appreciate
the occasional severity of that climate when told
of the incident which I now relate. General R. A. Alger,
of the Union army, ex-Governor of Michigan and ex-Secretary
of War, states that he was himself on picket
duty in winter and at night in this same section of
Virginia. It was his duty as officer in charge to visit
during the night the different picket posts and see that
the men were on the alert, so as to avoid surprises. It
was an intensely cold night, and on one of his rounds, a
few hours before daylight, he approached a post where
a solitary picket stood on guard. As he neared the post
he was greatly surprised to find that the soldier did not

halt him and force him to give the countersign. He could plainly
see the soldier standing on his post, leaning against a tree, and
was indignant because he supposed he had found one of his men
asleep on duty, when to remain awake and watchful was
essential to the army's safety. Walking up to his man, he took
him by the arm to arouse him from sleep and place him under
immediate arrest. He was horrified to find that the sentinel was
dead. Frozen, literally frozen, was this faithful picket, but still
standing at the post of duty where his commander had placed
him, his form erect and rigid--dead on his post!

Even at that early period the Southern men were scantily clad,
though we had not then reached the straits to which we came as
the war progressed, and of which a simple-hearted
countrywoman gave an approximate conception when she
naïvely explained that her son's only pair of socks did not wear
out, because "when the feet of the socks got full of holes I just
knitted new feet to the tops, and when the tops wore out I just
knitted new tops to the feet."

This remarkable deficiency in heavy clothing among the
Southern troops even at the beginning of the war is easily
explained. We were an agricultural people. Farming or planting
was fairly remunerative and brought comfort, with not only
financial but personal independence, which induced a large
majority of our population to cling to rural life and its delightful
occupations. Little attention, comparatively, was paid to mining or
manufacturing. The railroads were constructed through cotton
belts rather than through coal- and iron-fields. There were some
factories for the manufacture of cloth, but these were mainly
engaged upon cotton fabrics, and those which produced woollens
or heavy goods were few and of limited capacity. It will be seen
that in this situation, with small milling facilities, with great armies
on

our hands, and our ports closed against foreign importations,
we were reduced to the dangerous extremity of blockade-running,
and to the still more hazardous contingency of capturing
now and then overcoats and trousers from the Union forces.

Perhaps the utter lack of preparation for the war on the part of
the South is proof that its wisest statesmen anticipated no such
stupendous struggle as ensued. After the inauguration of the
government at Montgomery, the Confederacy could have
purchased the entire cotton crop--practically every bale left in the
Southern States at that season--with Confederate bonds or with
Confederate currency. The people, as a rule, had absolute faith in
the success and stability of the government. Thoughtful business
men took the bonds as an investment. Careful and conscientious
guardians sold the property of minors and invested the proceeds
in Confederate bonds. If, therefore, Southern statesmen had
believed that the Northern people would with practical unanimity
back the United States Government in a vigorous and determined
war to prevent the withdrawal of the Southern States, those able
men who led the South would undoubtedly have sought to place
the Confederacy in control of the cotton then on hand, and of
succeeding crops. It will be readily seen what an enormous
financial strength would have been thus acquired, and what a
basis for negotiations abroad would have been furnished. When
the price of cotton rose to twenty-five, forty, fifty cents per
pound (it was worth, I think, over ninety cents per pound at one
time), a navy for the Confederate Government could have been
purchased strong enough to have broken, by concentrated effort,
the blockade of almost any port on the Southern coast, thus
admitting arms, ammunition, clothing, tents, and medicine which would
have largely increased the efficiency of the Confederate armies.

At last after the winter months, each one of which seemed to us
almost a year, the snows on the Occoquan melted. The buds began
to swell, the dogwood to blossom, and the wild onions, which
the men gathered by the bushel and ate, began to shed their pungent
odor on the soft warm air. With the spring came also the marching and
the fighting. General McClellan landed his splendid army at Yorktown,
and threatened Richmond from the Virginia peninsula.
The rush then came to relieve from capture
the small force of General Magruder and to confront General
McClellan's army at his new base of operations. Striking camp
and moving to the nearest depot, we were soon on the way to
Yorktown. The long trains packed with their living Confederate
freight were hurried along with the utmost possible speed. As
the crowded train upon which I sat rushed under full head of
steam down grade on this single track, it was met by another
train of empty cars flying with great speed in the opposite
direction. The crash of the fearful collision and its harrowing
results are indescribable. Nearly every car on the densely
packed train was telescoped and torn in pieces; and men,
knapsacks, arms, and shivered seats were hurled to the front and
piled in horrid mass against the crushed timbers and ironwork.
Many were killed, many maimed for life, and the marvel is that
any escaped unhurt. Mrs. Gordon, who was with me on this ill-fated
train, was saved, by a merciful Providence, without the
slightest injury. Her hands were busied with the wounded, while
I superintended the cutting away of debris to rescue the maimed
and remove the dead.

From Yorktown it was the Confederates' time to retreat, and
it was a retreat to the very gates of Richmond. General
Johnston, however, like a lion pursued to his den, turned upon
McClellan, when there, with a tremendous bound.

On that memorable retreat it was my fortune for a time to
bring up the rear. The roads were in horrible condition. In the
mud and slush and deep ruts cut by the wagon-trains and
artillery of the retreating army, a number of heavy guns became
bogged and the horses were unable to drag them. My men,
weary with the march and belonging to a different arm of the
service, of course felt that it was a trying position to be
compelled to halt and attempt to move this artillery, with the
Union advance pressing so closely upon them. But they were
tugging with good grace when I rode up from the extreme rear.
An extraordinary effort, however, was required to save the
guns. As I dismounted from my horse and waded into the deep
mud and called on them to save the artillery, they raised a shout
and crowded around the wheels. Not a gun or caisson was lost,
and there was never again among those brave men a moment's
hesitation about leaping into the mud and water whenever it
became necessary on any account.

At another time on this march I found one of my youngest
soldiers--he was a mere lad--lying on the roadside, weeping
bitterly. I asked him what was the matter. He explained that his
feet were so sore that he could not walk any farther and that he
knew he would be captured. His feet were in a dreadful
condition. I said to him, "You shall not be captured," and
ordered him to mount my horse and ride forward until he could
get into an ambulance or wagon, and to tell the quartermaster to
send my horse back to me as soon as possible. He wiped his
eyes, got into my saddle, and rode a few rods to where the
company of which he was a member had halted to rest. He
stopped his horse in front of his comrades, who were sitting for
the moment on the roadside, and straightening himself up, he
lifted his old slouch-hat with all the dignity of a commander-in-chief
and called out: "Attention, men! I 'm about to bid

you farewell, and I want to tell you before I go that I am very
sorry for you. I was poor once myself!" Having thus delivered
himself, he galloped away, bowing and waving his hat to his
comrades in acknowledgment of the cheers with which they
greeted him.

After a few hours' pause and a brief but sharp engagement at
Williamsburg, General Johnston continued his retreat to his new
lines near the city of Richmond. On the banks of the
Chickahominy, if the Chickahominy can be said to have banks,
both armies prepared for the desperate struggles which were
soon to follow and decide the fate of the Confederate capital.
"On the Chickahominy!" Whatever emotions these words may
awaken in others, they bring to me some of the saddest
memories of those four years, in which were crowded the
experiences of an ordinary lifetime. Standing on picket posts in
the dreary darkness and sickening dampness of its miasmatic
swamps, hurrying to the front through the slush and bogs that
bordered it, fighting hip-deep in its turbid waters, I can see now
the faces of those brave men who never faltered at a command,
whatever fate obedience to it might involve.

During the weary days and nights preceding these battles,
the Southern troops, as they returned from outpost duty, kept the
camp in roars of laughter with soldier "yarns" about their
experiences at night at the front: how one man, relieved
temporarily from guard duty by his comrade of the next relief,
lay down on a log to catch a brief nap, and dreaming that he
was at home in his little bed, turned himself over and fell off the
log into the water at its side; how another, whose imagination
had been impressed by his surroundings, made the outpost
hideous with his frog-like croaking or snoring; and so on in
almost endless variety. I recall one private who had a genius for
drawing, and whose imaginative, clever caricatures afforded
much amusement

in camp. He would represent this or that comrade with a
frog-like face and the body and legs of a frog, standing in the
deep water, with knapsack high up on his back, his gun in one
hand and a "johnny-cake" in the other--the title below it being Bill
or Bob or Jake "on picket in the Chickahominy." A
characteristic story is told of a mess that was formed, with the
most remarkable regulations or by-laws. The men were to draw
straws to ascertain who should be the cook. The bylaws further
provided that the party thus designated should continue to cook
for the mess until some one complained of his cooking,
whereupon the man who made the first complaint should at
once be initiated into the office and the former incumbent
relieved. Of course, with this chance of escape before him, a
cook had no great incentive to perfect himself in the culinary art.
The first cook was not long in forcing a complaint. Calling his
mess to supper spread on an oil-cloth in the little tent, he
confidently awaited the result. One after another tasted and
quickly withdrew from the repast. One member, who was very
hungry and outraged at the character of the food, asked: "Joe,
what do you call this stuff, anyhow?"

"That? Why, that's pie," said Joe. "Well," replied the hungry
member, "if you call that pie, all I 've got to say is, it 's the - - - est
pie that I ever tasted."

Then, suddenly remembering that the penalty for complaining
was to take Joe's place, he quickly added, "But it 's all right, Joe;
I like it, but I am not hungry tonight." This after-thought came
too late, however. The by-laws were inflexible, and Joe's supper
had won his freedom. The poor complainant whose indignant
stomach had slaughtered his prudence was quietly but promptly
inducted into the position of chef for the mess.

Whatever rank may be assigned in history to the battle of
Seven Pines, or Fair Oaks, as the Union men

call it, it was to my regiment one of the bloodiest of my war
experience. Hurled, in the early morning, against the breastworks
which protected that portion of McClellan's lines, my troops
swept over and captured them, but at heavy cost. As I spurred my
horse over the works with my men, my adjutant, who rode at my
side, fell heavily with his horse down the embankment, and both
were killed. Reforming my men under a galling fire, and ordering
them forward in another charge upon the supporting lines, which
fought with the most stubborn resistance, disputing every foot of
ground, I soon found that Lieutenant-Colonel Willingham, as
gallant a soldier as ever rode through fire and who was my helper
on the right, had also been killed and his horse with him. Major
Nesmith, whose towering form I could still see on the left, was
riding abreast of the men and shouting in trumpet tones: "Forward,
men, forward!" but a ball soon silenced his voice forever.
Lieutenant-colonel, major, adjutant, with their horses, were all
dead, and I was left alone on horseback, with my men dropping
rapidly around me. My soldiers declared that they distinctly heard
the command from the Union lines, "Shoot that man on
horseback." In both armies it was thought that the surest way to
demoralize troops was to shoot down the officers. Nearly or quite
half the line officers of the twelve companies had by this time
fallen, dead or wounded. General Rodes, the superb
brigade-commander, had been disabled. Still I had marvellously
escaped, with only my clothing pierced. As I rode up and down
my line, encouraging the men forward, I passed my young brother,
only nineteen years old, but captain of one of the companies. He
was lying with a number of dead companions near him. He had
been shot through the lungs and was bleeding profusely. I did not
stop; I could not stop, nor would he permit me to stop. There
was no time for that--no time for anything

except to move on and fire on. At this time my own horse, the
only one left, was killed. He could, however, have been of little
service to me any longer, for in the edge of this flooded swamp,
heavy timber had been felled, making an abatis quite impassable
on horseback, and I should have been compelled to dismount.
McClellan's men were slowly being pressed back into and
through the Chickahominy swamp, which was filled with water;
but at almost every step they were pouring terrific vollies into my
lines. My regiment had been in some way separated from the
brigade, and at this juncture seemed to reach the climax of
extremities. My field officers and adjutant were all dead. Every
horse ridden into the fight, my own among them, was dead. Fully
one half of my line officers and half my men were dead or
wounded. A furious fire still poured from the front, and
reënforcements were nowhere in sight. The brigade-commander
was disabled, and there was no horse or means at hand of
communication with his headquarters or any other headquarters,
except by one of my soldiers on foot, and the chances ten to one
against his living to bear my message. In water from knee- to hip-deep,
the men were fighting and falling, while a detail propped up
the wounded against stumps or trees to prevent their drowning.
Fresh troops in blue were moving to my right flank and pouring a
raking fire down my line, and compelling me to change front
with my companies there. In ordering Captain Bell, whom I had
placed in command of that portion of my line, I directed that he
should beat back that flanking force at any cost. This faithful
officer took in at a glance the whole situation, and, with a
courage that never was and never will be surpassed, he and his
Spartan band fought until he and nearly all his men were killed;
and the small remnant, less than one fifth of the number carried
into the battle, were fighting still when the order came at last for
me to withdraw. Even in the

withdrawal there was no confusion, no precipitancy. Slowly
moving back, carrying their wounded comrades with them, and
firing as they moved, these shattered remnants of probably the
largest regiment in the army took their place in line with the
brigade.

The losses were appalling. All the field officers except myself
had been killed. Of forty-four officers of the line, but thirteen
were left for duty. Nearly two thirds of the entire command
were killed or wounded. My young brother, Captain Augustus
Gordon, who had been shot through the lungs, was carried back
with the wounded. He recovered, and won rapid promotion by
his high soldierly qualities, but fell at the head of his regiment in
the Wilderness with his face to the front, a grape-shot having
penetrated his breast at almost the same spot where he had
been formerly struck.

The disabling of General Rodes left the brigade temporarily
without a commander; but movement was succeeding movement
and battle following battle so rapidly that some one had to be
placed in command at once. This position fell to my lot. It was
not only unexpected, but unwelcome and extremely
embarrassing; for, of all the regimental commanders in the
brigade, I was the junior in commission and far the youngest in
years. My hesitation became known to my brother officers. With
entire unanimity and a generosity rarely witnessed in any sphere
of life, they did everything in their power to lessen my
embarrassment and uphold my hands. No young man with grave
responsibilities suddenly placed upon him ever had more constant
or more efficient support than was given to me by these noble
men.

I close this chapter by quoting a few sentences penned after
the battle by Major John Sutherland Lewis in reference to the
terrific strain upon Mrs. Gordon's sensibilities as she sat in sound
of that battle's roar. Major Lewis was Mrs. Gordon's uncle, an
elderly gentleman of

rare accomplishments. As he was without a family of his own,
and was devoted to his niece, he naturally watched over her
with the tender solicitude of a father, when it was possible for
him to be near her during the war. He died in very old age some
years after the close of hostilities, but he left behind him
touching tributes to his cherished niece, with whose remarkable
adventures he was familiar, and whose fortitude had amazed
and thrilled him. I quote only a few sentences from his pen in
this connection:

The battle in which Mrs. Gordon's husband was then engaged
was raging near the city with great fury. The cannonade was
rolling around the horizon like some vast earthquake on huge
crashing wheels. Whether the threads of wedded sympathy
were twisted more closely as the tremendous perils gathered
around him, it was evident that her anxiety became more and
more intense with each passing moment. She asked me to
accompany her to a hill a short distance away. There she
listened in silence. Pale and quiet, with clasped hands, she sat
statue-like, with her face toward the field of battle. Her
self-control was wonderful; only the quick-drawn sigh from the
bottom of the heart revealed the depth of emotion that was
struggling there. The news of her husband's safety afterward
and the joy of meeting him later produced the inevitable
reaction. The intensity of mental strain to which she had been
subjected had overtasked her strength, and when the excessive
tension was relaxed she was well-nigh prostrated; but a brief
repose enabled her to bear up with a sublime fortitude through
the protracted and trying experiences which followed the seven
days' battles around Richmond.

CHAPTER V

PRESENTIMENTS AND FATALISM AMONG SOLDIERS

Wonderful instances of prophetic foresight--Colonel Lomax predicts
his death--The vision of a son dying two days before it
happened--General Ramseur's furlough--Colonel Augustus Gordon's
calm announcement of his death--Instances of misplaced fatalism--
General D. H. Hill's indifference to danger.

AT the time of this battle I had brought to my immediate
knowledge, for the first time, one of those strange presentiments
or revelations, whatever they may be called, which so often
came to soldiers of both armies. Colonel Tennant Lomax, of
Alabama, was one of the leading citizens of that State. He was a
man of recognized ability and the most exalted character. With a
classic face and superb form, tall, erect, and commanding, he
would have been selected among a thousand men as the ideal
soldier. His very presence commanded respect and inspired
confidence. None who knew him doubted his certain promotion
to high command if his life were spared. The very embodiment
of chivalry, he was among the first to respond to the call to arms,
and, alas! he was among the earliest martyrs to the cause he so
promptly espoused. As he rode into the storm of lead, he turned
to me and said: "Give me your hand, Gordon, and let me bid you
good-by. I am going to be killed in this battle. I shall be dead in
half an hour." I endeavored to remove this impression from his
mind, but nothing I could say changed or appeared to modify

it in any degree. I was grieved to have him go into the fight with
such a burden upon him, but there was no tremor in his voice, no
hesitation in his words, no doubt on his mind. The genial smile
that made his face so attractive was still upon it, but he insisted
that he would be dead in half an hour, and that it was "all right."
The half-hour had scarcely passed when the fatal bullet had
numbered him with the dead.

Doubtless there were many of these presentiments which
were misleading, but I am inclined to believe that those which
were never realized were not such clear perceptions of coming
fate as in this case. They were probably the natural and strong
apprehensions which any man is liable to feel, indeed must feel
if he is a reasonable being, as he goes into a consuming fire.
There were many cases, however, which seemed veritable
visions into futurity.

General J. Warren Keifer, of Springfield, Ohio, a prominent
Union officer in the war between the States and Major-General
of Volunteers in the recent war with Spain, gave me in a letter
of January 18, 1898, an account of the accurate predictions
made by two of his officers as to approaching death. The first
case was that of Colonel Aaron W. Ebright, of the One
Hundred and Twenty-sixth Ohio Regiment, who was killed at
Opequan, Virginia, September 19, 1864. General Keifer encloses
me this memorandum, written at some previous date:

Colonel Ebright had a premonition of his death. A few moments
before 12 M. he sought me, and coolly told me he would be killed
before the battle ended. He insisted upon telling me that he wanted his
remains and effects sent to his home in Lancaster, Ohio, and I was
asked to write his wife as to some property in the West which he feared
she did not know about. He was impatient when I tried to remove the
thought of imminent death from his mind. A few moments later the time
for another advance came and the interview with Colonel Ebright
closed.

In less than ten minutes, while he was riding near me, he fell
dead from his horse, pierced in the breast by a rifle-ball. His
apprehension of death was not prompted by fear. He had been
through the slaughters of the Wilderness and Cold Harbor, had
fought his regiment in the dead-angle of Spottsylvania, and led it
at Monocacy. It is needless to say I complied with his request.

Another remarkable presentiment to which General Keifer
has called my attention was that of Captain William A.
Hathaway, who served on General Keifer's staff as assistant
adjutant-general. At Monocacy, Maryland, July 9, 1864, where
my division did the bulk of the fighting for the Confederates,
Captain Hathaway assured his brother officers of the certainty
of his early death. Turning a deaf ear to their efforts to drive the
presentiment from his mind, he rode bravely into the storm, and
fell at almost the first deadly volley.

Colonel Warren Akin was one of Georgia's leading lawyers
before the war. He was a Whig and a Union man and opposed
to secession, but followed his State, when she left the Union.
Although he was neither by profession nor practice a politician,
his recognized ability, and the universal confidence of the people
in his integrity as well as in his fidelity to every trust, caused his
power to be felt in the State, and led a great political party to
nominate him before the war as candidate for governor. Few
men of his day were better known or more loved and respected.
He was a Christian without cant, and his courage, while
conspicuous, had in it none of the elements of wanton
recklessness. He was a thoughtful, brave, and balanced man. In
1861 and 1863 he was Speaker of the Georgia House of
Representatives. During the remainder of the war he was a
member from Georgia of the Confederate House of
Representatives, where he was an ardent and faithful champion
of President Davis and his administration.

A revelation or soul-sight so strange and true came to him
shortly before Lee's surrender that it seems necessary to
accompany its insertion here by this hasty analysis of his exalted
mental and moral characteristics. Just before day on the
morning of February 8, 1865, while in Richmond, he had a vision--
whether an actual dream or some inexplicable manifestation
akin thereto he never knew. In this vision he saw his eldest son
lying on his back at the foot of a chinaberry-tree on the sidewalk
in front of the home he then occupied in Elberton, Georgia, his
head in a pool of blood. He ran to him, found him not dead but
speechless and unconscious, raised him up by his left hand, and
the blood ran out of his right ear. With a start, Colonel Akin
came to full consciousness, inexpressibly disturbed. He
immediately decided to leave for home, telegraphic
communication being cut off. But in a few minutes be received
a cheerful letter from his wife, stating that all were well, and this
reassured him. On the afternoon of the second day after, this
son was thrown from a horse against this same chinaberry-tree,
at the foot of which he lay, unconscious and speechless; and a
neighbor, seeing him fall, ran up to him, grasped him by his left
hand, and lifted him from the pool of blood which ran from his
right ear. On the third day after the boy died, unconscious to the
end. Colonel Akin knew nothing of his death until about three
weeks later, no intelligence of the sad event reaching him sooner
because of interrupted mails. Thus happened, two days after he
foresaw it, a tragedy which from its nature was wholly
unexpected, and which occurred in minutest detail exactly as
Colonel Akin had seen it in his vision of the night.

Major-General Ramseur, of North Carolina, was an officer
whose record was equalled by few in the Confederate army.
He had won his major-general's stars and wreath by his notable
efficiency on the march and in the

camp, as well as in battle. Of the men of high rank in the army
with whom I was intimately associated, none were further
removed from superstition or vain and unreal fancies. He had
been married since the war began, and there had been born to
him, at his home in North Carolina, a son whom he had never
seen. On the night preceding the great battle of Cedar Creek,
the corps which I commanded, and in which he commanded a
division, was filing slowly and cautiously in the darkness along
the dim and almost impassable trail around the point, and just
over the dangerous precipices of Massanutten Mountain.
General Ramseur and I sat on the bluff overlooking the field on
which he was soon to lay down his life. He talked most tenderly
and beautifully of his wife and baby boy, whom he so longed to
see. Finally, a little before dawn, the last soldier of the last
division had passed the narrow defile, and the hour for the
advance upon the Union forces had arrived. As General
Ramseur was ready to ride into battle at the head of his splendid
division, he said to me, "Well, general, I shall get my furlough to-day."
I did not know what he meant. I did not ask what he
meant. It was not a time for questions. But speedily the message
came, and his furlough was granted. It came not by mail or wire
from the War Department at Richmond, but from the blue lines
in his front, flying on the bullet's wing. The chivalric soldier, the
noble-hearted gentleman, the loving husband, had been
furloughed--forever furloughed from earth's battles and cares.

My younger brother, Augustus Gordon, captain and later
lieutenant-colonel, furnished another illustration of this
remarkable foresight of approaching death. Brave and lovable, a
modest though brilliant young soldier, he was rapidly winning his
way to distinction. A youth of scarcely twenty-one years, he
was in command of the Sixth Regiment of Alabama. Before
going into the fight

in the Wilderness, he quietly said: "My hour has come." I joked
and chided him. I told him that he must not permit such
impressions to affect or take hold upon his imagination. He
quickly and firmly replied: "You need not doubt me. I will be at
my post. But this is our last meeting." Riding at the head of his
regiment, with his sword above him, the fire of battle in his eye
and words of cheer for his men on his lips, the fatal grape-shot
plunged through his manly heart, and the noble youth slept his
last sleep in that woful Wilderness.

It would require a volume simply to record without comment
the hundreds of such presentiments in both the Union and
Confederate armies during the war. The few here noted will
suffice, however, to raise the inquiry as to what they meant.
Who shall furnish a satisfactory solution? What were these
wonderful presentiments? They were not the outpourings of a
disordered brain. They came from minds thoroughly balanced,
clear and strong--minds which worked with the precision of
perfect machinery, even amid the excitement and fury of battle.
They were not the promptings of an unmanly fear of danger or
apprehension of death; for no men ever faced both danger and
death with more absolute self-poise, sublimer courage, or
profounder consecration. Nor were these presentiments mere
speculations as to chances. They were perceptions. There was
about them no element of speculation. Their conspicuous
characteristic was certainty. The knowledge seemed so firmly
fixed that no argument as to possible mistake, no persuasion,
could shake it. Where did that knowledge come from? It seems
to me there can be but one answer, and that answer is another
argument for immortality. It was the whispering of the Infinite
beyond us to the Infinite within us--a whispering inaudible to
the natural ear, but louder than the roar of battle to the spirit
that heard it.

There was another class of soldiers who had a sort of blind
faith in their own invulnerability; but it differed wholly, radically,
from the presentiments which I am considering. Several of these
cases came also under my immediate observation. In one case,
this blind faith, as I term it, was the result of long army
experience of the man whose remarkable escape from wounds
in several wars had left upon his mind its natural effect. In
another case it was a highly developed belief in the doctrine of
predestination, which gave great comfort to its possessor, adding
to the courage that was inherent in him another element which
rendered him indifferent, apparently, to exposure to fire or
protection from it.

The first illustration was that of a soldier under my command--
Vickers of the Sixth Alabama Regiment. There was no better
soldier in either army than Vickers. He had passed unscathed
through two previous wars, in Mexico, I believe, and in
Nicaragua. He was in every battle with his regiment in our Civil
War until his death, and always at the front. The greater the
danger, the higher his spirits seemed to soar. The time came,
however, when his luck, or fate, in whose fickle favor he so
implicitly trusted, deserted him. At Antietam--Sharpsburg--I
called for some one who was willing to take the desperate
chances of carrying a message from me to the commander on
my right. Vickers promptly volunteered, with some characteristic
remark which indicated his conviction that he was not born to be
killed in battle. There was a cross-fire from two directions
through which he had to pass and of which he had been advised;
but he bounded away with the message almost joyously. He had
not gone many steps from my side when a ball through his head,
the first and last that ever struck him, had placed this brave
soldier beyond the possibility of realizing, in this world at least, the
treachery of that fate on which he depended.

The other case was that of Lieutenant-General D. H. Hill, and
the particular occasion which I select, and which aptly illustrates
his remarkable faith, was the battle of Malvern Hill. At that time
he was major-general of the division in which I commanded
Rodes's brigade. He was my friend. The personal and official
relations between us, considering the disparity in our ages, were
most cordial and even intimate. He was closely allied to
Stonewall Jackson, and in many respects his counterpart. His
brilliant career as a soldier is so well known that any historical
account of it, in such a book as I am writing, would be wholly
unnecessary. I introduce him here as a most conspicuous
illustration of a faith in Providence which, in its steadiness and
strength and in its sustaining influence under great peril, certainly
touched the margin of the sublime. At Malvern Hill, where
General McClellan made his superb and last stand against
General Lee's forces, General Hill took his seat at the root of a
large tree and began to write his orders. At this point McClellan's
batteries from the crest of a high ridge, and his gunboats from
the James River, were ploughing up the ground in every direction
around us. The long shells from the gunboats, which our men
called "McClellan's gate-posts," and the solid shot from his
heavy guns on land, were knocking the Confederate batteries to
pieces almost as fast as they could be placed in position. The
Confederate artillerists fell so rapidly that I was compelled to
detail untrained infantry to take their places. And yet there sat
that intrepid officer, General D. H. Hill, in the midst of it all,
coolly writing his orders. He did not place the large tree between
himself and the destructive batteries, but sat facing them. I urged
him to get on the other side of the tree and avoid such needless
and reckless exposure. He replied, "Don't worry about me; look
after the men. I am not going to be killed until my time comes."
He had

scarcely uttered these words when a shell exploded in our
immediate presence, severely shocking me for the moment, a
portion of it tearing through the breast of his coat and rolling him
over in the newly ploughed ground. This seemed to convert him
to a more rational faith; for he rose from the ground, and,
shaking the dirt from his uniform, quietly took his seat on the
other side of the tree.

As for myself, I was never in a battle without realizing that
every moment might be my last; but I never had a presentiment
of certain death at a given time or in a particular battle. There
did come to me, on one occasion, a feeling that was akin to a
presentiment. It was, however, the result of no supposed
perception of certain coming fate, but an unbidden, unwelcome
calculation of chances--suggested by the peculiar circumstances
in which I found myself at the time. It was at Winchester, in the
Valley of Virginia. My command was lying almost in the shadow
of a frowning fortress in front, in which General Milroy, of the
Union army, was strongly intrenched with forces which we had
been fighting during the afternoon. In the dim twilight, with the
glimmer of his bayonets and brass howitzers still discernible, I
received an order to storm the fortress at daylight the next
morning. To say that I was astounded at the order would feebly
express the sensation which its reading produced; for on either
side of the fort was an open country, miles in width, through
which Confederate troops could easily pass around and to the
rear of the fort, cutting off General Milroy from the base of his
supplies, and thus forcing him to retire and meet us in the open
field. There was nothing for me to do, however, but to obey the
order. As in the night I planned the assault and thought of the
dreadful slaughter that awaited my men, there came to me, as I
have stated, a calculation as to chances, which resulted in the
conclusion that I

had not one chance in a thousand to live through it. The weary
hours of the night had nearly passed, and by the dim light of my
bivouac fire I wrote, with pencil, what I supposed was my last
letter to Mrs. Gordon, who, as usual, was near me. I summoned
my quartermaster, whose duties did not call him into the fight,
and gave him the letter, with directions to deliver it to Mrs.
Gordon after I was dead. Mounting my horse, my men now
ready, I spoke to them briefly and encouraged them to go with
me into the fort. Before the dawn we were moving, and soon
ascending the long slope. At every moment I expected the storm
of shell and ball that would end many a life, my own among
them; but on we swept, and into the fort, to find not a soldier
there! It had been evacuated during the night.

CHAPTER VI

BATTLE OF MALVERN HILL

Continuous fighting between McClellan's and Lee's armies--Hurried burial of
the dead--How "Stonewall" Jackson got his name--The secret of his
wonderful power--The predicament of my command at Malvern Hill--A
fruitless wait for reënforcements-- Character the basis of true courage--
Anecdote of General Polk.

AFTER the bloody encounter at Seven Pines, or Fair Oaks, the
dead of both armies were gathered, under a flag of truce, for
burial. An inspection of the field revealed a scene sickening and
shocking to those whose sensibilities were not yet blunted by
almost constant contact with such sights. It would not require a
very vivid imagination to write of Chickahominy's flooded
swamps as "incarnadined waters," in which floated side by side
the dead bodies clad in blue and in gray. All over the field near
the swamp were scattered in indiscriminate confusion the
motionless forms and ghastly faces of fellow-countrymen who
had fallen bravely fighting each other in a battle for principles--
enemies the day before, but brothers then in the cold embrace of
an honorable death. Dying at each other's hands in support of
profoundly cherished convictions, their released spirits had
ascended together on the battle's flame to receive the reward of
the unerring tribunal of last appeal.

The fighting between the armies of McClellan and Lee was
so nearly continuous, and engagement succeeded engagement
so rapidly, that at some points the killed

were hurriedly and imperfectly buried. I myself had a most
disagreeable reminder of this fact. The losses in Rodes's brigade,
which I was then commanding, had been so heavy that it was
held with other troops as a reserved corps. Our experiences,
however, on the particular day of which I now speak had been
most trying, and after nightfall I was directed to move to a
portion of the field where the fighting had been desperate on the
preceding day, and to halt for the night in a woodland. Overcome
with excessive fatigue, as soon as the designated point was
reached I delivered my horse to a courier and dropped down on
the ground for a much-needed rest. In a few moments I was
sound asleep. A slightly elevated mound of earth served for a
pillow. Frequently during the night I attempted to brush away
from my head what I thought in my slumber was a twig or limb
,of the underbrush in which I was lying. My horror can be
imagined when I discovered, the next morning, that it was the
hand of a dead soldier sticking out above the shallow grave
which had been my pillow and in which he had been only partly
covered.

Up to this period my association with General Jackson
(Stonewall) had not been sufficiently close for me clearly to
comprehend the secret of his wonderful success, but I learned it
a few days later at Malvern Hill. The sobriquet "Stonewall"
was applied to him during the first great engagement of the war
at Manassas, or Bull Run. His brigade was making a superb
stand against General McDowell's column, which had been
thrown with such momentum upon the Southern flank as to
threaten the destruction of the whole army. General Bee, of
South Carolina, whose blood was almost the earliest sprinkled on
the Southern altar, determined to lead his own brigade to another
charge, and looking across the field, he saw Jackson's men
firmly, stubbornly resisting the Federal advance. General Bee, in
order to

kindle in the breasts of his men the ardor that glowed in his own,
pointed to Jackson's line and exclaimed: "See, there stands
Jackson like a stone wall!" Bee himself fell in the charge, but
he had christened Jackson and his brigade by attaching to them
a peculiar and distinctive name which will live while the history
of our Civil War lives.

I have said that at Malvern Hill I learned the secret of
Jackson's wonderful power and success as a soldier. It was due
not only to his keen and quick perception of the situation in
which he found himself at each moment in the rapidly changing
scenes as the battle progressed or before it began, but notably to
an implicit faith in his own judgment when once made up. He
would formulate that judgment, risk his last man upon its
correctness, and deliver the stunning blow, while others less
gifted were hesitating and debating as to its wisdom and safety.
Whatever this peculiar power may be called, this mental or
moral gift, whether inspiration or intuition, it was in him a
profound conviction that he was not mistaken, that the result
would demonstrate that the means he employed must
necessarily attain the end which he thought to accomplish. The
incident to which I refer was trivial in itself, but it threw a flood
of light upon his marvellous endowment. I sat on my horse,
facing him and receiving instructions from him, when Major-General
Whiting, himself an officer of high capacity, rode up in
great haste and interrupted Jackson as he was giving to me a
message to General Hill. With some agitation, Whiting said:
"General Jackson, I find, sir, that I cannot accomplish what you have directed
unless you send me some additional infantry and another battery"; and he
then proceeded to give the reasons why the order could not be
executed with the forces at his disposal. All this time, while
Whiting explained and argued, Jackson sat on his horse like a
stone

statue. He looked neither to the right nor the left. He made no
comment and asked no questions; but when Whiting had
finished, Jackson turned his flashing eyes upon him and used
these words, and only these: "I have told you what I wanted
done, General Whiting"; and planting his spurs in his horse's
sides, he dashed away at a furious speed to another part of the
field. Whiting gazed at Jackson's disappearing figure in
amazement, if not in anger, and then rode back to his command.
The result indicated the accuracy of Jackson's judgment and the
infallibility of his genius, for Whiting did accomplish precisely
what Jackson intended, and he did it with the force which
Jackson had placed in his hands.

Returning, after my interview with Jackson, to my position on
the extreme right, I found General Hill in a fever of impatience
for the advance upon McClellan's troops, who were massed,
with their batteries, on the heights in our front. The hour for the
general assault which was to be made in the afternoon by the
whole Confederate army had come and passed. There had been,
however, the delays usual in all such concerted movements.
Some of the divisions had not arrived upon the field; others, from
presumably unavoidable causes, had not taken their places in
line: and the few remaining hours of daylight were passing.
Finally a characteristic Confederate yell was heard far down the
line. It was supposed to be the beginning of the proposed general
assault. General Hill ordered me to lead the movement on the
right, stating that he would hurry in the supports to take their
places on both my flanks and in rear of my brigade. I made the
advance, but the supports did not come. Indeed, with the
exception of one other brigade, which was knocked to pieces in
a few minutes, no troops came in view. Isolated from the rest of
the army and alone, my brigade moved across this shell-ploughed
plain toward the heights, which were perhaps

more than half a mile away. Within fifteen or twenty
minutes the centre regiment (Third Alabama), with which I
moved, had left more than half of its number dead and wounded
along its track, and the other regiments had suffered almost as
severely. One shell had killed six or seven men in my immediate
presence. My pistol, on one side, had the handle torn off; my
canteen, on the other, was pierced, emptying its contents--water
merely--on my trousers; and my coat was ruined by having a
portion of the front torn away: but, with the exception of this
damage, I was still unhurt. At the foot of the last steep ascent,
near the batteries, I found that McClellan's guns were firing over
us, and as any further advance by this unsupported brigade would
have been not only futile but foolhardy, I halted my men and
ordered them to lie down and fire upon McClellan's standing lines
of infantry. I stood upon slightly elevated ground in order to watch
for the reënforcements, or for any advance from the heights upon
my command. In vain I looked behind us for the promised
support. Anxiously I looked forward, fearing an assault upon my
exposed position. No reënforcements came until it was too late.
As a retreat in daylight promised to be almost or quite as deadly
as had been the charge, my desire for the relief which nothing but
darkness could now bring can well be imagined. In this state of
extreme anxiety a darkness which was unexpected and terrible
came to me alone. A great shell fell, buried itself in the ground,
and exploded near where I stood. It heaved the dirt over me,
filling my face and ears and eyes with sand. I was literally
blinded. Not an inch before my face could I see; but I could think,
and thoughts never ran more swiftly through a perplexed mortal
brain. Blind! Blind in battle! Was this to be permanent? Suppose
reënforcements now came, what was I to do? Suppose there
should be an assault upon my command from the front?

Such were the unspoken but agonizing questions which throbbed
in my brain with terrible swiftness and intensity. The blindness,
however, was of short duration. The delicate and perfect
machinery of the eye soon did its work. At last came, also, the
darkness for which I longed, and under its thick veil this splendid
brigade was safely withdrawn.

Large bodies of troops had been sent forward, or rather led
forward, by that intrepid commander, General Hill; but the
unavoidable delay in reaching the locality, and other intervening
difficulties, prevented them from ever reaching the advanced
position from which my men withdrew. In the hurry and bustle
of trying to get them forward, coming as they did from different
directions, there was necessarily much confusion, and they were
subjected to the same destructive fire through which my troops
had previously passed. In the darkness, even after the firing had
ceased, there occurred, in the confusion, among these mixed up
bodies of men, many amusing mistakes as to identity, and some
altercations between officers which were not so amusing and
not altogether complimentary. One of my men ran to me and
asked, "Did you hear - - - say to - - - that he and
his men," etc.--I
forbear to quote the remaining part of the question. I replied that
I had not heard it, but if it had occurred as reported to me we
would probably hear of it again--and we did. Early the next
morning a challenge was sent, but the officer who had given the
offence was in a playful mood when the challenge reached him;
so, instead of accepting it, or answering it in the formal style
required by the duelling code, he replied in about these words:

MY DEAR - - -: I did not volunteer
to fight you or any other
Confederate, but if you and your men will do better in the next battle I
will take back all I said to you last night. In the meantime,
I am,

These officers are both dead now, and I give this incomplete
account of the incident to show how easy it was to get up a fight
along in the sixties, if one were so disposed, either in a general
mêlée with the blue-coated lines, or single-handed with a gray-clad
comrade.

I believe it was in this battle that was first perpetrated that
rustic witticism which afterward became so famous in the army.
Through one of the wide gaps made in the Confederate lines by
McClellan's big guns as they sent their death-dealing missiles
from hill and river, there ran a panic-stricken rabbit, flying in
terror to the rear. A stalwart mountaineer noticed the speed and
the direction which the rabbit took to escape from his
disagreeable surroundings. He was impressed by the rabbit's
prudence, and shouted, so that his voice was heard above the din
of the battle: "Go it, Molly Cottontail! I wish I could go with you!"
One of his comrades near by caught up the refrain, and
answered: "Yes, and, 'y golly, Jim, I 'd go with Molly, too, if it
was n't for my character."

"Character." What a centre shot this rough soldier had fired
in that short sentence! He had analyzed unconsciously but
completely the loftiest type of courage. He felt like flying to the
rear, as "Molly" was flying, but his character carried him
forward. His sense of the awful dangers, the ominous hissing of
the deadly Minié balls, and the whizzing of the whirling shells
tearing through the ranks and scattering the severed limbs of his
falling comrades around him, all conspired to bid him fly to the
rear; but his character, that noblest of human endowments,
commanded, "Forward!" and forward he went.

In this connection I am reminded of the commonplace but
important truth that the aggregate character of a people of any
country depends upon the personal character of its individual
citizens; and that the stability of

popular government depends far more upon the character,
the individual personal character of its people, than it does upon
any constitution that could be adopted or statutes that could be
enacted. What would safeguards be worth if the character of
the people did not sustain and enforce them? The constitution
would be broken, the laws defied; riot and anarchy would
destroy both, and with them the government itself. I am not
assuming or suggesting that this country is in any present danger
of such an experience; but of all the countries on earth this one,
with its universal suffrage, its divergent and conflicting interests,
its immense expanse of territory, and its large population, made
up from every class and clime, and still to be increased in the
coming years, is far more dependent than any other upon the
character of its people. It is a great support to our hope for the
future and to our confidence in the stability of this government to
recall now and then some illustration of the combination of
virtues which make up character, as they gleam with peculiar
lustre through the darkest hours of our Civil War period. That
war not only gave the occasion for its exhibition, but furnished
the food upon which character fed and grew strong. There were
many thousands of men in both armies who did not say in words,
but said by deeds, that "character" would not let them consult
their fears or obey the impulse of their heels. I could fill this
book with such cases, and yet confine myself to either one of
the armies.

I received the particulars of another incident illustrating this
truth from a Union officer who was present when the desperate
and successful effort was made to hold the little fort at Altoona,
Georgia, against the assault by the Confederates. They had
surrounded it and demanded its surrender. The demand was
refused, whereupon an awful and consuming fire was opened
upon the small force locked up in the little fortress.

Steadily and rapidly the men fell in the fort. No place could
be found within its dirt walls where even the wounded could be laid, so as
to protect them from the galling Confederate fire; but still they fought and
refused to surrender. Finally, in utter despair, some one proposed to raise
the white flag. Instantly there rang around the fort a chorus of indignant protest:
"Who says surrender? Shoot the man who proposes it!" In the
face of the fact that at every moment the men were dying, and that apparently
certain destruction awaited all, what was it that inspired that protest
against surrender? There is but one answer. It was character.
Those men had been ordered there to hold that fort. A grave responsibility
had been imposed; a trust of most serious nature had been committed to them;
and although their commander had been shot down, all the officers
killed or wounded, and the ammunition nearly exhausted, yet their manhood,
their fidelity, their character bade them fight on. They had no "Molly," with
its white cotton-tail, bidding them fly to the rear, but they did have the
suggestion of the white flag. Around them, as around the high-spirited
Confederate at Malvern Hill, the storm of death in wildest fury was raging;
and in both cases, as in ten thousand other cases, they turned a deaf
ear to all suggestions of personal danger. The answer to such suggestions,
though differing in phraseology, was the same in both cases--character.

While the heroic men at Altoona were rapidly falling but still
fighting, with chances of successful resistance diminishing as each
dreadful moment passed, the signal-flag from a spur of Kennesaw
Mountain sent them that famous message from General Sherman: "Hold
the fort. I am coming."

During a visit to northern Pennsylvania, in recent years,
an officer of the signal corps stated incidentally that
they had succeeded in interpreting the Confederate

signals, and that while General Johnston's army was at
Kennesaw this Union corps caught the signal message announcing
that Lieutenant-General Polk had just been killed, and that the
fact was announced in the Northern papers as soon, or perhaps before,
it was announced to the Southern troops. It is probable that the signal
corps of the Southern armies were at times able to interpret the signals
of the other side. In one way or another, the high secrets of the two
sides generally leaked out and became the property of the opponents
by right of capture.

The reference to General's Polk's death recalls an anecdote
told of him in the army, which aptly illustrates the great
enthusiasm with which he fought, and which he never failed
to impart to his splendid corps. General Leonidas Polk was a
prince among men and an officer of marked ability. He was a
bishop of the Episcopal Church. His character was beautiful
in its simplicity and its strength. He was an ardent admirer of
General Cheatham, who was one of the most furious fighters
of Johnston's army. Cheatham, when the furor of battle was
on him, was in the habit of using four monosyllables which
were more expressive than polished, but in his case they expressed
with tremendous emphasis the "gloria certaminis." These four
monosyllables, which became notable in the army as "Cheatham's
expression," were: "Give 'em hell, boys!" General Polk, as I
have said, was an ardent admirer of General Cheatham as a soldier,
and on one occasion, as the bishop-general rode along his
lines, when they were charging the works in front, and as the rebel
yell rang out his natural enthusiasm carried him, for the
moment, off his balance. In the exhilaration of the charge the bishop
was lost in the soldier, and he shouted: "Give it to 'em, boys!
Give 'em what General Cheatham says!"

CHAPTER VII

ANTIETAM

Restoration of McClellan to command of the Federals--My command at
General Lee's centre--Remarkable series of bayonet charges by the Union
troops--How the centre was held--Bravery of the Union commander--A
long struggle for life.

THE war had now assumed proportions altogether vaster than
had been anticipated by either the North or the South. No man at
the North, perhaps no man on either side, had at its beginning a
clearer perception of the probable magnitude of the struggle
than General W. T. Sherman. Although he was regarded even
then by his people as an officer of unusual promise, and a typical
representative of the courage and constancy of the stalwart sons
of the great West, yet he called upon himself and his prophecy
the criticism of those whose views did not accord with his
predictions. However uncomfortable these criticisms may have
been to his friends, they did not seem to disturb his equanimity or
force him to modify his opinion that it would require a vastly
larger army than was generally supposed necessary to penetrate
the heart of the South. He seemed to have, at that early period, a
well-defined idea of the desperate resistance to be made by the
Southern people. Possibly this ability to look into the future may
have been in some measure due to a superior knowledge of the
characteristics of the Southern people acquired during his former
residence among them; but whatever the

source of his information, General Sherman lived to see the
correctness of his opinions abundantly verified. Some years after
the war, when General Sherman visited Atlanta, the brilliant and
witty Henry W. Grady, in a speech made to him on his arrival,
playfully referred to the former visit of the general, and to the
condition in which that visit had left the city. Grady said: "And
they do say, general, that you are a little careless about fire."
General Sherman must have felt compensated for any allusions
to the marks he had left when "marching through Georgia" by
the courtesies shown him while in Atlanta, as well as by the
people's appreciation of the remarkably generous terms offered
by him to General Johnston's army at the surrender in North
Carolina. Those terms were rejected in Washington because of
their liberality.

Like two mighty giants preparing for a test of strength, the
Union and Confederate armies now arrayed themselves for still
bloodier encounters. In this encounter the one went down, and
in that the other; but each rose from its fall, if not with renewed
strength, at least with increased resolve. In the Southwest, as
well as in Virginia, the blows between the mighty contestants
came fast and hard. Both were in the field for two and a half
years more of the most herculean struggle the world has ever
witnessed.

At Antietam, or Sharpsburg, as the Confederates call it, on
the soil of Maryland, occurred one of the most desperate though
indecisive battles of modern times. The Union forces numbered
about 60,000, the Confederates about 35,000. This battle left its
lasting impress upon my body as well as upon my memory.

General George B. McClellan, after his displacement, had
been again assigned to the command of the Union forces. The
restoration of this brilliant soldier seemed to have imparted new
life to that army. Vigorously

following up the success achieved at South Mountain, McClellan,
on the 16th day of September, 1862, marshalled his veteran
legions on the eastern hills bordering the Antietam. On the
opposite slopes, near the picturesque village of Sharpsburg, stood
the embattled lines of Lee. As these vast American armies, the
one clad in blue and the other in gray, stood contemplating each
other from the adjacent hills, flaunting their defiant banners, they
presented an array of martial splendor that was not equalled,
perhaps, on any other field. It was in marked contrast with other
battle-grounds. On the open plain, where stood these hostile
hosts in long lines, listening in silence for the signal summoning
them to battle, there were no breastworks, no abatis, no
intervening woodlands, nor abrupt hills, nor hiding-places, nor
impassable streams. The space over which the assaulting
columns were to march, and on which was soon to occur the
tremendous struggle, consisted of smooth and gentle undulations
and a narrow valley covered with green grass and growing corn.
From the position assigned me near the centre of Lee's lines,
both armies and the entire field were in view. The scene was not
only magnificent to look upon, but the realization of what it meant
was deeply impressive. Even in times of peace our sensibilities
are stirred by the sight of a great army passing in review. How
infinitely more thrilling in the dread moments before the battle to
look upon two mighty armies upon the same plain, "beneath
spread ensigns and bristling bayonets," waiting for the impending
crash and sickening carnage!

Behind McClellan's army the country was open and traversed
by broad macadamized roads leading to Washington and
Baltimore. The defeat, therefore, or even the total rout of Union
forces, meant not necessarily the destruction of that army, but,
more probably, its temporary disorganization and rapid retreat
through a country

abounding in supplies, and toward cities rich in men and means.
Behind Lee's Confederates, on the other hand, was the Potomac
River, too deep to be forded by his infantry, except at certain
points. Defeat and total rout of his army meant, therefore, not
only its temporary disorganization, but its possible destruction.
And yet that bold leader did not hesitate to give battle. Such was
his confidence in the steadfast courage and oft-tested prowess
of his troops that he threw his lines across McClellan's front with
their backs against the river. Doubtless General Lee would have
preferred, as all prudent commanders would, to have the river in
his front instead of his rear; but he wisely, as the sequel proved,
elected to order Jackson from Harper's Ferry, and, with his
entire army, to meet McClellan on the eastern shore rather than
risk the chances of having the Union commander assail him
while engaged in crossing the Potomac.

On the elevated points beyond the narrow valley the Union
batteries were rolled into position, and the Confederate heavy
guns unlimbered to answer them. For one or more seconds, and
before the first sounds reached us, we saw the great volumes of
white smoke rolling from the mouths of McClellan's artillery.
The next second brought the roar of the heavy discharges and
the loud explosions of hostile shells in the midst of our lines,
inaugurating the great battle. The Confederate batteries
promptly responded; and while the artillery of both armies
thundered, McClellan's compact columns of infantry fell upon
the left of Lee's lines with the crushing weight of a land-slide.
The Confederate battle line was too weak to withstand the
momentum of such a charge. Pressed back, but neither
hopelessly broken nor dismayed, the Southern troops, enthused
by Lee's presence, reformed their lines, and, with a shout as
piercing as the blast of a thousand bugles, rushed in counter-charge
upon the exulting Federals, hurled them back in confusion,

and recovered all the ground that had been lost. Again
and again, hour after hour, by charges and counter-charges, this
portion of the field was lost and recovered, until the green corn
that grow upon it looked as if it had been struck by a storm of
bloody hail.

Up to this hour not a shot had been fired in my front. There
was an ominous lull on the left. From sheer exhaustion, both
sides, like battered and bleeding athletes, seemed willing to rest.
General Lee took advantage of the respite and rode along his
lines on the right and centre. He was accompanied by Division
Commander General D. H. Hill. With that wonderful power
which he possessed of divining the plans and purposes of his
antagonist, General Lee had decided that the Union
commander's next heavy blow would fall upon our centre, and
those of us who held that important position were notified of this
conclusion. We were cautioned to be prepared for a determined
assault and urged to hold that centre at any sacrifice, as a break
at that point would endanger his entire army. My troops held the
most advanced position on this part of the field, and there was no
supporting line behind us. It was evident, therefore, that my small
force was to receive the first impact of the expected charge and
to be subjected to the deadliest fire. To comfort General Lee and
General Hill, and especially to make, if possible, my men still
more resolute of purpose, I called aloud to these officers as they
rode away: "These men are going to stay here, General, till the
sun goes down or victory is won." Alas! many of the brave
fellows are there now.

General Lee had scarcely reached his left before the
predicted assault came. The day was clear and beautiful, with
scarcely a cloud in the sky. The men in blue filed down the
opposite slope, crossed the little stream (Antietam), and formed
in my front, an assaulting column four lines deep. The front
line came to a "charge

bayonets," the other lines to a "right shoulder shift." The
brave Union commander, superbly mounted, placed himself in
front, while his band in rear cheered them with martial music. It
was a thrilling spectacle. The entire force, I concluded, was
composed of fresh troops from Washington or some camp of
instruction. So far as I could see, every soldier wore white
gaiters around his ankles. The banners above them had
apparently never been discolored by the smoke and dust of
battle. Their gleaming bayonets flashed like burnished silver in
the sunlight. With the precision of step and perfect alignment of
a holiday parade, this magnificent array moved to the charge,
every step keeping time to the tap of the deep-sounding drum.
As we stood looking upon that brilliant pageant, I thought, if I did
not say, "What a pity to spoil with bullets such a scene of
martial beauty!" But there was nothing else to do. Mars is not an
aesthetic god; and he was directing every part of this game in
which giants were the contestants. On every preceding field
where I had been engaged it had been my fortune to lead or
direct charges, and not to receive them; or else to move as the
tides of battle swayed in the one direction or the other. Now my
duty was to move neither to the front nor to the rear, but to stand
fast, holding that centre under whatever pressure and against
any odds.

Every act and movement of the Union commander in my
front clearly indicated his purpose to discard bullets and depend
upon bayonets. He essayed to break through Lee's centre by the
crushing weight and momentum of his solid column. It was my
business to prevent this; and how to do it with my single line was
the tremendous problem which had to be solved, and solved
quickly; for the column was coming. As I saw this solid mass of
men moving upon me with determined step and front of steel,
every conceivable plan of meeting

and repelling it was rapidly considered. To oppose
man against man and strength against strength was
impossible; for there were four lines of blue to my
one of gray. My first impulse was to open fire upon
the compact mass as soon as it came within reach of
my rifles, and to pour into its front an incessant
hail-storm of bullets during its entire advances across
the broad, open plain; but after a moment's reflection
that plan was also discarded. It was rejected because,
during the few minutes required for the column to reach
my line, I could not hope to kill and disable a sufficient
number of the enemy to reduce his strength to an equality
with mine. The only remaining plan was one which I had
never tried but in the efficacy of which I had the utmost
faith. It was to hold my fire until the advancing Federals
were almost upon my lines, and then turn loose a sheet of flame
and lead into their faces. I did not believe that any troops
on earth, with empty guns in their hands, could withstand so
sudden a shock and withering a fire. The programme was fixed
in my own mind, all horses were sent to the rear, and my men
were at once directed to lie down upon the grass and clover.
They were quickly made to understand, through my aides and
line officers, that the Federals were coming upon them with
unloaded guns; that not a shot would be fired at them, and
that not one of our rifles was to be discharged until my
voice should be heard from the centre commanding "Fire!"
They were carefully instructed in the details. They
were notified that I would stand at the centre, watching
the advance, while they were lying upon their breasts with
rifles pressed to their shoulders, and that they were not
to expect my order to fire until the Federals were so close
upon us that every Confederate bullet would take effect.

There was not artillery at this point upon either side, and
not a rifle was discharged. The stillness was literally

oppressive, as in close order, with the commander still
riding in front, this column of Union infantry moved
majestically in the charge. In a few minutes they were within
easy range of our rifles, and some of my impatient men
asked permission to fire. "Not yet," I replied. "Wait for the order."
Soon they were so close that we might have seen the eagles
on their buttons; but my brave and eager boys still waited
for the order. Now the front rank was within a few rods of where
I stood. It would not do to wait another second, and with all my lung
power I shouted "Fire!"

My rifles flamed and roared in the Federals' faces like
a blinding blaze of lightning accompanied by the quick and
deadly thunderbolt. The effect was appalling. The entire front
line, with few exceptions, went down in the consuming blast.
The gallant commander and his horse fell in a heap near where
I stood--the horse dead, the rider unhurt. Before his
rear lines could recover from the terrific shock, my exultant
men were on their feet, devouring them with successive volleys.
Even then these stubborn blue lines retreated in fairly good
order. My front had been cleared; Lee's centre had been saved;
and yet not a drop of blood had been lost by my men.
The result, however, of this first effort to penetrate
the Confederate centre did not satisfy the intrepid Union
commander. Beyond the range of my rifles he reformed
his men into three lines, and on foot led them to the
second charge, still with unloaded guns. This advance
was also repulsed; but again and again did he advance
in four successive charges in the fruitless effort to
break through my lines with the bayonets. Finally his
troops were ordered to load. He drew up in close rank
and easy range, and opened a galling fire upon my line.

I must turn aside from my story at this point to express
my regret that I have never been able to ascertain the
name of this lion-hearted Union officer. His indomitable

will and great courage have been equalled on other fields
and in both armies; but I do not believe they have ever been
surpassed. Just before I fell and was borne unconscious from
the field, I saw this undaunted commander attempting to lead his
men in another charge.

The fire from these hostile American lines at close quarters
now became furious and deadly. The list of the slain was
lengthened with each passing moment. I was not at the front
when, near nightfall, the awful carnage ceased; but one of my
officers long afterward assured me that he could have walked on
the dead bodies of my men from one end of the line to the other.
This, perhaps, was not literally true; but the statement did not
greatly exaggerate the shocking slaughter. Before, I was wholly
disabled and carried to the rear, I walked along my line and
found an old man and his son lying side by side. The son was
dead, the father mortally wounded. The gray-haired hero called
me and said: "Here we are. My boy is dead, and I shall go soon;
but it is all right." Of such were the early volunteers.

My extraordinary escapes from wounds in all the previous
battles had made a deep impression upon my comrades as well
as upon my own mind. So many had fallen at my side, so often
had balls and shells pierced and torn my clothing, grazing my
body without drawing a drop of blood, that a sort of blind faith
possessed my men that I was not to be killed in battle. This
belief was evidenced by their constantly repeated expressions:
"They can't hurt him." "He's as safe one place
as another." "He's got a charmed life."

If I had allowed these expressions of my men to have any
effect upon my mind the impression was quickly dissipated when
the Sharpsburg storm came and the whizzing Miniés, one after
another, began to pierce my body.

The first volley from the Union lines in my front sent a ball
through the brain of the chivalric Colonel Tew, of North
Carolina, to whom I was talking, and another ball through the
calf of my right leg. On the right and the left my men were
falling under the death-dealing crossfire like trees in a hurricane.
The persistent Federals, who had lost so heavily from repeated
repulses, seemed now determined to kill enough Confederates to
make the debits and credits of the battle's balance-sheet more
nearly even. Both sides stood in the open at short range and
without the semblance of breastworks, and the firing was doing
a deadly work. Higher up in the same leg I was again shot; but
still no bone was broken. I was able to walk along the line and
give encouragement to my resolute riflemen, who were firing
with the coolness, and steadiness of peace soldiers in target
practice. When later in the day the third ball pierced my left arm,
tearing asunder the tendons and mangling the flesh, they caught
sight of the blood running down my fingers, and these devoted
and big-hearted men, while still loading their guns, pleaded with
me to leave them and go to the rear, pledging me that they
would stay there and fight to the last. I could not consent to
leave them in such a crisis. The surgeons were all busy at the
field-hospitals in the rear, and there was no way, therefore, of
stanching the blood, but I had a vigorous constitution, and this
was doing me good service.

A fourth ball ripped through my shoulder, leaving its base and
a wad of clothing in its track. I could still stand and walk,
although the shocks and loss of blood had left but little of my
normal strength. I remembered the pledge to the commander
that we would stay there till the battle ended or night came. I
looked at the sun. It moved very slowly; in fact, it seemed to
stand still. I thought I saw some wavering in my line, near the
extreme right, and Private Vickers, of Alabama, volunteered

to carry any orders I might wish to send. I directed him to
go quickly and remind the men of the pledge to General Lee, and
to say to them that I was still on the field and intended to stay
there. He bounded away like an Olympic racer; but he had gone
less than fifty yards when he fell, instantly killed by a ball through
his head. I then attempted to go myself, although I was bloody
and faint, and my legs did not bear me steadily. I had gone but a
short distance when I was shot down by a fifth ball, which struck
me squarely in the face, and passed out, barely missing the
jugular vein. I fell forward and lay unconscious with my face in
my cap; and it would seem that I might have been smothered by
the blood running into my cap from this last wound but for the
act of some Yankee, who, as if to save my life, had at a previous
hour during the battle, shot a hole through the cap, which let the
blood out.

I was borne on a litter to the rear, and recall nothing more till
revived by stimulants at a late hour of the night. I found myself
lying on a pile of straw at an old barn, where our badly wounded
were gathered. My faithful surgeon, Dr. Weatherly, who was
my devoted friend, was at my side, with his fingers on my pulse.
As I revived, his face was so expressive of distress that I asked
him: "What do you think of my case, Weatherly?" He made a
manly effort to say that he was hopeful. I knew better, and said:
"You are not honest with me. You think I am going to die; but I
am going to get well." Long afterward, when the danger was
past, he admitted that this assurance was his first and only basis
of hope.

General George B. Anderson, of North Carolina, whose
troops were on my right, was wounded in the foot, but, it was
thought, not severely. That superb man and soldier was dead in
a few weeks, though his wound was supposed to be slight,
while I was mercifully sustained

through a long battle with wounds the combined effect of which
was supposed to be fatal. Such are the mysterious concomitants
of cruel war.

Mrs. Gordon was soon with me. When it was known that the
battle was on, she had at once started toward the front. The
doctors were doubtful about the propriety of admitting her to my
room; but I told them to let her come. I was more apprehensive
of the effect of the meeting upon her nerves than upon mine. My
face was black and shapeless--so swollen that one eye was
entirely hidden and the other nearly so. My right leg and left arm
and shoulder were bandaged and propped with pillows. I knew
she would be greatly shocked. As she reached the door and
looked, I saw at once that I must reassure her. Summoning all
my strength, I said: "Here's your handsome (?) husband; been to
an Irish wedding." Her answer was a suppressed scream,
whether of anguish or relief at finding me able to speak, I do not
know. Thenceforward, for the period in which my life hung in
the balance, she sat at my bedside, trying to supply concentrated
nourishment to sustain me against the constant drainage. With
my jaw immovably set, this was exceedingly difficult and
discouraging. My own confidence in ultimate recovery, however,
was never shaken until erysipelas, that deadly foe of the
wounded, attacked my left arm. The doctors told Mrs. Gordon to
paint my arm above the wound three or four times a day with
iodine. She obeyed the doctors by painting it, I think, three or
four hundred times a day. Under God's providence, I owe my
life to her incessant watchfulness night and day, and to her
tender nursing through weary weeks and anxious months.

CHAPTER VIII

CHANCELLORSVILLE

A long convalescence--Enlivened by the author of "Georgia Scenes"
--The movement upon Hooker's army at Chancellorsville--Remarkable
interview between Lee and Stonewall Jackson--The secret of Jackson's
character--The storming of Marye's Heights--Some famous war-horses.

IT was nearly seven months after the battle of Antietam, or
Sharpsburg, before I was able to return to my duties at the
front. Even then the wound through my face had not healed; but
Nature, at last, did her perfect work, and thus deprived the army
surgeons of a proposed operation. Although my enforced
absence from the army was prolonged and tedious, it was not
without its incidents and interest. Some of the simple-hearted
people who lived in remote districts had quaint conceptions of
the size of an army. One of these, a matron about fifty years of
age, came a considerable distance to see me and to inquire
about her son. She opened the conversation by asking: "Do you
know William?"

"What William, madam?"

"My son William."

I replied: "Really, I do not know whether I have ever met
your son William or not. Can you tell me what regiment or
brigade or division or corps he belongs to?"

She answered: "No, I can't, but I know he belongs to Gin'al
Lee's company."

I was something of a fraud because I did not know every man in
"Gin'al Lee's company"--especially William.

After I had begun to convalesce, it was my privilege to be
thrown with the author of "Georgia Scenes," Judge Augustus
Baldwin Longstreet, who was widely known in the Southern
States as an able jurist, a distinguished educator, and an eminent
Methodist divine, as well as a great humorist and wit. His book,
"Georgia Scenes," is now rarely seen, and it may be interesting to
those who have never known of Judge Longstreet or his famous
stories to give an instance here of the inimitable fun of this
many-sided genius, who aided me in whiling away the time of my
enforced absence from the army. Judge Longstreet was at that
time an old man, but still full of the fire of earlier years, and of
that irresistible humor with which his conversation sparkled. On
one occasion, when a number of gentlemen were present, I
asked the judge to give us the facts which led him to write that
remarkable story called "The Debating Society." He said that
Mr. McDuffie, who afterward became one of the South's great
statesmen, was his classmate and roommate at school. Both
were disposed to stir into the monotony of school days a little
seasoning of innocent fun. During one of the school terms, they
were appointed a committee to select and propose to the society
a suitable subject for debate. As they left the hall, Longstreet
said to his friend, "Now, McDuffie, is our chance. If we could
induce the society to adopt for debate some subject which
sounds well, but in which there is no sense at all, would n't it be a
great joke?" McDuffie's reply was a roar of laughter. They
hastened to their room to begin the selection of the great subject
for debate. They agreed that each should write all the
high-sounding phrases he could think of, and then by comparing notes,
and combining the best of both, they

could make up their report. They sat up late, conferring and
laughing at the suggestions, and at last concocted the question,
"Whether at public elections should the votes of faction
predominate by internal suggestions, or the bias of
jurisprudence?" With boyish glee they pronounced their work
well done, and laughed themselves to sleep. On the next morning
their report was to be submitted, and the society was to vote as
to its adoption. They arose early, full of confidence in their ability
to palm off this wonderful subject on the society; for they
reasoned thus: no boy will be willing to admit that he is less
intelligent or less able to comprehend great public questions or
metaphysical subjects than the committee, and therefore each
one of them will at once pretend to be delighted at the selection,
and depend upon reading and investigation to prepare himself
for the following week's debate upon it. They had not
miscalculated the chances of success, nor underestimated the
boyish pride of their schoolmates. The question was unanimously
adopted.

It is impossible to give any conception of Judge Longstreet's
description of the debate upon the question; of how he and
McDuffie led off with thoroughly prepared speeches full of
resounding rhetoric and rounded periods, but as devoid of sense
as the subject itself, the one arguing the affirmative, the other the
negative of the proposition. Nor shall I attempt any description of
Judge Longstreet's wonderful mimicry of the boys, many of
whom became men of distinction in after years; of how they
stammered and struggled and agonized in the effort to rise to the
height of the great argument; and finally, of the effort of the
president of the society, who was, of course, one of the
schoolboys, to sum up the points made and determine on which
side were the weightiest and most cogent arguments. Suffice it
to say that I recall with grateful pleasure the hours spent during
my convalescence

in the presence of this remarkable man. His
inimitable and delicate humor was the sunshine of his useful and
laborious life, and will remain a bright spot in my recollections of
the sixties.

On my return to the army, I was assigned to the command of
perhaps the largest brigade in the Confederate army, composed
of six regiments from my own State, Georgia. No more superb
material ever filled the ranks of any command in any army. It
was, of course, a most trying moment to my sensibilities when
the time came for my parting from the old command with which
I had passed through so many scenes of bitter trial; but these
men were destined to come back to me again. It is trite, but
worth the repetition, to say that there are few ties stronger and
more sacred than those which bind together in immortal
fellowship men who with unfaltering faith in each other have
passed through such scenes of terror and blood.

Years afterward, my daughter met a small son of one of
these brave comrades, and asked him his name.

"Gordon Wright," was his prompt reply.

"And for whom are you named, Gordon?"

"I don't know, miss," he answered, "but I believe my mamma
said I was named for General Lee."

I had been with my new command but a short time when the
great battle of Chancellorsville occurred. It was just before this
bloody engagement that my young brother had so accurately and
firmly predicted his own death, and it was here the immortal
Jackson fell. I never write or pronounce this name without an
impulse to pause in veneration for that American phenomenon.
The young men of this country cannot study the character of
General Jackson without benefit to their manhood, and for those
who are not familiar with his characteristics I make this
descriptive allusion to him.

from that of the Union men in his front, will perhaps never be
definitely determined. The general, the almost universal, belief at
the South is that he was killed by a volley from the Confederate
lines; but I have had grave doubts of this raised in my own mind
by conversations with thoughtful Union officers who were at the
time in his front and near the point where be was killed. It
seems to me quite possible that the fatal ball might have come
from either army. This much-mooted question as to the manner
of his death is, however, of less consequence than the manner of
his life. Any life of such nobility and strength must always be a
matter of vital import and interest.

At the inception of the movement upon General Hooker's
army at Chancellorsville, a remarkable interview occurred
between General Lee and General Jackson, which is of peculiar
interest because it illustrates, in a measure, the characteristics of
both these great soldiers.

It was repeated to me soon after its occurrence, by the Rev.
Dr. Lacey, who was with them at the time Jackson rode up to
the Commander-in-Chief, and said to him: "General Lee, this is
not the best way to move on Hooker."

"Well, General Jackson, you must remember that I am
compelled to depend to some extent upon information furnished
me by others, especially by the engineers, as to the topography,
the obstructions, etc., and these engineers are of the opinion that
this is a very good way of approach."

"Your engineers are mistaken, sir."

"What do you know about it, General Jackson? You have
not had time to examine the situation."

"But I have, sir; I have ridden over the whole field."

And he had. Riding with the swiftness of the wind and looking
with the eye of an eagle, he had caught the

strong and weak points of the entire situation, and was back on
his panting steed at the great commander's side to assure him
that there was a better route.

"Then what is to be done, General Jackson?"

"Take the route you yourself at first suggested. Move on the
flank--move on the flank."

"Then you will at once make the movement, sir."

Immediately and swiftly, Jackson's "foot cavalry," as they
were called, were rushing along a byway through the dense
woodland. Soon the wild shout of his charge was heard on the
flank and his red cross of battle was floating over General
Hooker's breastworks.

General Hooker, "Fighting Joe," as he was proudly called by
his devoted followers, and whom it was my pleasure to meet and
to know well after the war, was one of the brilliant soldiers of
the Union army. He was afterward hailed as the hero of the
"Battle of the Clouds" at Lookout Mountain, and whatever may
be said of the small force which he met in the fight upon that
mountain's sides and top, the conception was a bold one. It is
most improbable that General Hooker was informed as to the
number of Confederates he was to meet in the effort to capture
the high and rugged Point Lookout, which commanded a perfect
view of the city of Chattanooga and the entire field of operations
around it. His movement through the dense underbrush, up the
rocky steeps, and over the limestone cliffs was executed with a
celerity and dash which reflected high credit upon both the
commander and his men. Among these men, by the way, was
one of those merrymakers--those dispensers of good cheer--found in both the Confederate and Union armies, who were
veritable fountains of good-humor, whose spirits glowed and
sparkled in all situations, whether in the camp, on the march, or
under fire. The special rôle of this one was to entertain his
comrades with song, and as Hooker's men were struggling

up the sides of Lookout Mountain, climbing over the huge rocks,
and being picked off them by the Confederate sharpshooters, this
frolicsome soldier amused and amazed his comrades by singing,
in stentorian tones, his droll camp-song, the refrain of which was
"Big pig, little pig, root hog or die." The singer was H. S.
Cooper,
now a prominent physician of Colorado.

But to return to the consideration of General Jackson's
character. Every right-minded citizen, as well as every knightly
soldier, whatever the color of his uniform, will appreciate the
beauty of the tribute paid by General Lee, to General Jackson,
when he received the latter's message announcing the loss of his
left arm. "Go tell General Jackson," said Lee, "that his loss is
small compared to mine; for while he loses his left arm, I lose
the right arm of my army." No prouder or juster tribute was ever
paid by a great commander to a soldier under him.

But a truth of more importance than anything I have yet said
of Jackson may be compassed, I think, in the observation that he
added to a marvellous genius for war a character as man and
Christian which was absolutely without blemish. His childlike
trust and faith, the simplicity, sincerity, and constancy of his
unostentatious piety, did not come with the war, nor was it
changed by the trials and dangers of war. If the war affected
him at all in this particular, it only intensified his religious devotion,
because of the tremendous responsibilities which it imposed; but
long before, his religious thought and word and example were
leading to the higher life young men intrusted to his care, at the
Virginia Military Institute. In the army nothing deterred or
diverted him from the discharge of his religious duties, nor
deprived him of the solace resulting from his unaffected trust. A
deep-rooted belief in God, in His word and His providence, was
under him and over him and through him, permeating every fibre
of his being,

dominating his every thought, controlling his every action.
Wherever he went and whatever he did, whether he was
dispensing light and joy in the family circle; imparting lessons of
lofty thought to his pupils in the schoolroom at Lexington;
planning masterful strategy in his tent; praying in the woods for
Heaven's guidance; or riding like the incarnate spirit of war
through the storm of battle, as his resistless legions swept the
field of carnage with the fury of a tornado--Stonewall Jackson
was the faithful disciple of his Divine Master. He died as he had
lived, with his ever-active and then fevered brain working out
the problems to which his duty called
him, and, even with the chill of death upon him, his loving heart
prompted the message to his weary soldiers, "Let us cross over
the river and rest in the shade of the trees." That his own spirit
will eternally rest in the shade of the Tree of Life, none who
knew him can for one moment doubt.

An incident during this battle illustrates the bounding spirits of
that great cavalry leader, General "Jeb" Stuart. After Jackson's
fall, Stuart was designated to lead Jackson's troops in the final
charge. The soul of this brilliant cavalry commander was as full
of sentiment as it was of the spirit of self-sacrifice. He was as
musical as he was brave. He sang as he fought. Placing himself
at the head of Jackson's advancing lines and shouting to them
"Forward," he at once led off in that song, "Won't you come out
of the wilderness?" He changed the words to suit the occasion.
Through the dense woodland, blending in strange harmony with
the rattle of rifles, could be distinctly heard that song and words,
"Now, Joe Hooker, won't you come out of the wilderness?" This
dashing Confederate lost his life later in battle near Richmond.

While the battle was progressing at Chancellorsville, near
which point Lee's left rested, his right extended to

or near Fredericksburg. Early's division held this position, and my
brigade the right of that division; and it was determined that
General Early should attempt, near sunrise, to retake the fort on
Marye's Heights, from which the Confederates had been driven
the day before. I was ordered to move with this new brigade,
with which I had never been in battle, and to lead in that assault;
at least, such was my interpretation of the order as it reached me.
Whether it was my fault or the fault of the wording of the order
itself, I am not able to say; but there was a serious
misunderstanding about it. My brigade was intended, as it
afterward appeared, to be only a portion of the attacking force,
whereas I had understood the order to direct me to proceed at
once to the assault upon the fort; and I proceeded. As I was
officially a comparative stranger to the men of this brigade, I said
in a few sentences to them that we should know each other
better when the battle of the day was over; that I trusted we
should go together into that fort, and that if there were a man in
the brigade who did not wish to go with us, I would excuse him if
he would stop to the front and make himself known. Of course,
there was no man found who desired to be excused, and I then
announced that every man in that splendid brigade of Georgians
had thus declared his purpose to go into the fortress. They
answered this announcement by a prolonged and thrilling shout,
and moved briskly to the attack. When we were under full
headway and under fire from the heights, I received an order to
halt, with the explanation that the other troops were to unite in
the assault; but the order had come too late. My men were
already under heavy fire and were nearing the fort. They were
rushing upon it with tremendous impetuosity. I replied to the order
that it was too late to halt then, and that a few minutes more
would decide the result of the charge. General Early playfully but
earnestly remarked,

after the fort was taken, that success had saved me
from being court-martialed for disobedience to orders.

During this charge I came into possession of a most
remarkable horse, whose fine spirit convinced me that horses
now and then, in the furor of fight, were almost as sentient as
their riders. This was especially true of the high-strung
thoroughbreds. At least, such was my experience with a number
of the noble animals I rode, some of which it was my painful
fortune to leave on the field as silent witnesses of the storm
which had passed over it. At Marye's Heights, the horse which I
had ridden into the fight was exhausted in my effort to personally
watch every portion of my line as it swept forward, and he had
been in some way partially disabled, so that his movements
became most unsatisfactory. At this juncture the beautiful animal
to which I have referred, and from which a Union officer had just
been shot, galloped into our lines. I was quickly upon her back,
and she proved to be the most superb battle-horse that it was my
fortune to mount during the war. For ordinary uses she was by no
means remarkable--merely a good saddle animal, which Mrs.
Gordon often rode in camp, and which I called "Marye," from the
name of the hill where she was captured. Indeed, she was
ordinarily rather sluggish, and required free use of the spur. But
when the battle opened she was absolutely transformed. She
seemed at once to catch the ardor and enthusiasm of the men
around her. The bones of her legs were converted into steel
springs and her sinews into india-rubber. With head up and
nostrils distended, her whole frame seemed to thrill with a delight
akin to that of foxhounds when the hunter's horn summons them
to the chase. With the ease of an antelope, she would bound
across ditches and over fences which no amount of coaxing or
spurring could induce her to undertake when not under the
excitement of

battle. Her courage was equal to her other high qualities. She
was afraid of nothing. Neither the shouting of troops, nor the
rattle of rifles, nor the roar of artillery,
nor their bursting shells, intimidated her in the slightest degree. In
addition to all this, she seemed to have a charmed life, for she
bore me through the hottest fires and was never wounded.

I recall another animal of different temperament, turned over
to me by the quartermaster, after capture, in exchange, as usual,
for one of my own horses. In the Valley of Virginia, during the
retreat of the Union General, Milroy, my men captured a horse
of magnificent appearance and handsomely caparisoned. He
was solid black in color and dangerously treacherous in
disposition. He was brought to me by his captors with the
statement that he was General Milroy's horse, and he was at
once christened "Milroy" by my men. I have no idea that he
belonged to the general, for that officer was too true a soldier to
have ridden such a beast in battle--certainly not after one test of
his cowardice. His fear of Minié balls was absolutely
uncontrollable. He came near disgracing me in the first and only
fight in which I attempted to ride him. Indeed, if it had chanced
to be my first appearance under fire with my men, they would
probably have followed my example as they saw me flying to the
rear on this elephantine brute. He was an immense horse of
unusually fine proportions, and had behaved very well under the
cannonading; but as we drew nearer the blue lines in front, and
their musketry sent the bullets whistling around his ears, he
wheeled and fled at such a rate of speed that I was powerless to
check him until he had carried me more than a hundred yards to
the rear. Fortunately, some of the artillerymen aided me in
dismounting, and promptly gave me a more reliable steed, on
whose back I rapidly returned in time to redeem my reputation.
My obligations

to General Milroy were very great for having evacuated at
night the fort at Winchester (near which this horse was
captured), and for permitting us to move over its deserted and
silent ramparts in perfect security; but if this huge black horse
were really his, General Milroy, in leaving him for me, had
cancelled all the obligations under which he had placed me.

This Georgia brigade, with its six splendid regiments, whose
war acquaintance I had made at Marye's Heights, contributed
afterward from their pittance of monthly pay, and bought, without
my knowledge, at a fabulous price, a magnificent horse, and
presented him to me. These brave and self-denying men realized
that such a horse would cost more than I could pay. He gave me
great comfort, and I hoped that, like "Marye," he might go
unscathed through successive battles; but at Monocacy, in
Maryland, he paid the forfeit of his life by coming in collision with
a whizzing missile, as he was proudly galloping along my lines,
then advancing upon General Lew Wallace's forces. I deeply
regretted this splendid animal's death, not only because of his
great value at the time, but far more because he was the gift of
my gallant men.

In one of the battles in the Wilderness, in 1864, and during a
flank movement, a thoroughbred bay stallion was captured--a
magnificent creature, said to have been the favorite war-horse of
General Shaler, whom we also captured. As was customary, the
horse was named for his former master, and was known by no
other title than "General Shaler." My obligations to this horse
are twofold and memorable: he saved me from capture, when I
had ridden, by mistake, into Sedgwick's corps by night; and at
Appomattox he brought me enough greenbacks to save me from
walking back to Georgia. He was so handsome that a Union
officer, who was a judge of horses, asked me if I wished to sell
him. I at once assured

this officer that I would be delighted to sell the horse or
anything else I possessed, as I had not a dollar except
Confederate money, which, at that period of its history, was
somewhat below par. The officer, General Curtin, of
Pennsylvania, generously paid me in greenbacks more than I
asked for the horse. I met this gentleman in 1894, nearly thirty
years afterward, at Williamsport, Pennsylvania. He gratified me
again by informing me that he had sold "General Shaler" for a
much higher price than he paid me for him. 1

If there is a hereafter for horses, as there is a heaven for the
redeemed among men, I fear that the old black traitor that ran
away with me from the fight will never reach it, but the brave
and trusty steeds that so gallantly bore their riders through our
American Civil War will not fail of admittance.

Job wrote of the war-horse that "smelleth the battle from afar
off." Alexander the Great had his "Bucephalus," that dashed
away as if on wings as his daring master mounted him. Zachary
Taylor had his "Old Whity," from whose mane and tail the
American patriots pulled for souvenirs nearly all the hairs, as he
grazed on the green at the White House. Lee had his "Traveller,"
whose memory is perpetuated in enduring bronze.
Stonewall Jackson had his high-mettled "Old Sorrel," whose life
was nursed with tenderest care long after the death of his
immortal rider; but if I were a poet I would ignore them all and
embalm in song my own glorious "Marye," whose spirit I would
know was that of Joan of Arc, if the transmigration of souls
were true.

1 Since writing this chapter, I have learned that this horse was a noted animal
in the Union army, and had been named "Abe," for President Lincoln.

CHAPTER IX

WAR BY THE BRAVE AGAINST THE BRAVE

The spirit of good-fellowship between Union and Confederate soldiers--
Disappearance of personal hatred as the war progressed--The Union officer
who attended a Confederate dance--American chivalry at Vicksburg--Trading
between pickets on the Rappahannock--Incidents of the bravery of
color-bearers on both sides--General Curtis's kindness--A dash for life
cheered by the enemy.

THAT inimitable story-teller, Governor Robert Taylor, of
Tennessee, delights his hearers by telling in charming style of a
faithful colored man, Allen, a slave of his father's. Both Allen
and his owner were preachers, and Allen was in the habit each
Saturday afternoon of going to his master and learning from him
what his text for the following day's sermon would be. On this
occasion the Rev. Dr. Taylor informed the Rev. Allen that his
text for the morrow would be the words, "And he healed them
of divers diseases." "Yes, sir," said Allen; ["]dat's a mighty good
tex', and hit will be mine for my Sunday sarmon." Sunday came
and Allen was ready. He announced his "tex' " in these words:
"And he healed 'em of all sorts of diseases, and even of dat wust
of complaints called de divers." Proceeding to an elucidation of
his text, he described with much particularity the different kinds
of diseases that earthly doctors could cure, and then, with
deepest unction, said: "But, my congregation, if de divers ever
gits one of you, jest make up your mind you's a gone nigger,
'cep'in' de Lord save you."

In 1861 a disorder had taken possession of the minds of the
people in every section of the country. Internecine war,
contagious, infectious, confluent, was spreading, and destined to
continue spreading until nearly every home in the land was
affected and hurt by it. This dreadful disease had about it some
wonderful compensations. No one went through it from a high
sense of duty without coming out of it a braver, a better, and a
more consecrated man. It is a great mistake to suppose that war
necessarily demoralizes and makes obdurate those who wage it.
Doubtless wars of conquest, for the sake of conquest, for the
purpose of despoiling the vanquished and enriching the victors,
and all wars inaugurated from unhallowed motives, do demoralize
every man engaged in them, from the commanding general to the
privates. But such was not the character of our Civil War. On
the contrary, it became a training-school for the development of
an unselfish and exalted manhood, which increased in efficiency
from its opening to its close. At the beginning there was personal
antagonism and even bitterness felt by individual soldiers of the
two armies toward each other. The very sight of the uniform of
an opponent aroused some trace of anger. But this was all gone
long before the conflict had ceased. It was supplanted by a
brotherly sympathy. The spirit of Christianity swayed the hearts
of many, and its benign influence was perhaps felt by the great
majority of both armies. The Rev. Charles Lane, recently a
member of the faculty of the Georgia Technological Institute, told
me of a soldier who could easily have captured or shot his
antagonist at night; but the religious devotion in which that foe at
the moment was engaged shielded him from molestation, and he
was left alone in communion with his God. That knightly soldier
of the Confederacy, whose heart so promptly sympathized with
his devout antagonist, was also a "soldier of the cross."

The same spirit was shown in the case of a Pennsylvania
soldier who was attracted by the songs in a Confederate
prayer-meeting, and, without the slightest fear of being detained or held
as prisoner, attempted in broad daylight to cross over and join
the Confederates in their worship. He was ordered back by his
own pickets; but his officers appreciated his impulse and he was
not subjected to the slightest punishment. In a European army he
most likely would have been shot for attempted desertion,
although he had made no effort whatever to conceal his
movements or his purposes.

The broadening of this Christian fellowship was plainly seen
as the war progressed. The best illustration of this fact which I
now recall is the contrast between the impulses which moved
the two soldiers just mentioned, and that which inspired the
quaint prayer of a devout Confederate at the beginning of the
war and at the grave of his dead comrade. He concluded his
prayer in about these words: "And now, Lord, we commit the
body of our comrade to the grave, with the hope of meeting him
again, with all the redeemed, in that great day and in the home
prepared for thy children. For we are taught to believe that thy
true followers shall come from the East and West as well as
from the South; and we cannot help hoping, Lord, that a few will
come even from the North."

It was not alone in the religious life of the army that these
evidences of expanding brotherhood were exhibited. I should,
perhaps, not exaggerate the number or importance of these
evidences if I said that there were thousands of them which are
perhaps the brightest illustrations and truest indices of the
American soldier's character.

In 1896 an officer of the Union army told me the following
story, which is but a counterpart of many which came under my
own observation. A lieutenant of a Delaware regiment was
officer of the picket-line on the

banks of the Rappahannock. The pickets of the two armies
were, as was usual at that time, very near each other and in
almost constant communication. It was in midwinter and no
movements of the armies were expected. The Confederate
officer of pickets who was on duty on the opposite bank of the
narrow stream asked the Union lieutenant if he would not come
over after dark and go with him to a farm-house near the lines,
where certain Confederates had invited the country girls to a
dance. The Union officer hesitated, but the Confederate insisted,
and promised to call for him in a boat after dark, and to lend him
a suit of citizen's clothes, and pledged his honor as a soldier to
see him safely back to his own side before daylight the next
morning. The invitation was accepted, and at the appointed hour
the Confederate's boat glided silently to the place of meeting on
the opposite bank. The citizen's suit was a ludicrous fit, but it
served its purpose. The Union soldier was introduced to the
country girls as a new recruit just arrived in camp. He enjoyed
the dance, and, returning with his Confederate escort, was safely
landed in his own lines before daylight. Had the long roll of the
kettledrum summoned the armies to battle on that same morning,
both these officers would have been found in the lines under
hostile ensigns, fighting each other in deadly conflict.

In Kansas City recently an ex-Confederate recorded his
name upon the hotel register. Mr. James Locke, of Company E,
One Hundredth Pennsylvania Volunteers, was in the same hotel,
and observed the name on the register. Locke had lost a leg at
the second Manassas, and a Confederate had carried him out of
the railroad cut in which he lay suffering, and had ministered to
his wants as best he could. Locke had asked this soldier in gray
before leaving him to write his name in his (Locke's) war diary.
The Confederate did so,

and was then compelled to hurry forward with his command.
He had, however, in the spirit of a true soldier, provided the
suffering Pennsylvanian with a canteen of water before he left
him. There was nothing unmanly in the moistened eyes of these
brave men when they so unexpectedly and after so many years
met in Kansas City for the first time since they parted at the
railroad cut on a Virginia battle-field.

This spirit of American chivalry was exhibited almost
everywhere on the wonderful retreat of Joseph E. Johnston
before General Sherman from Dalton to Atlanta. At Resaca, at
Kennesaw, along the banks of Peachtree Creek, and around
Atlanta, between the lines that encircled the doomed city, the
same friendly greetings were heard between the pickets, and the
same evidences of comradeship shown before the battles began
and after they had ended. In the trenches around Vicksburg, and
during its long and terrible bombardment, the men in the outer
lines would call to each other to stop firing for a while, that they
"wanted to get out into fresh air!" The call was always
heeded, and both sides poured out of their bomb-proofs like rats
from their holes when the cats are away. And whenever an
order came to open fire, or the time had expired, they would call:
"Hello, there, Johnnie," or "Hello, there, Yank," as the case might
be. "Get into your holes now; we are going to shoot."

What could have been more touchingly beautiful than that
scene on the Rapidan when, in the April twilight, a great band in
the Union army suddenly broke the stillness with the loved
strains of "Hail Columbia, Happy Land," calling from the Union
camps huzzas that rolled like reverberating thunders on the
evening air. Then from the opposite hills and from Confederate
bands the answer came in the thrilling strains of "Dixie." As it
always does and perhaps always will, "Dixie" brought

from Southern throats an impassioned response. Then, as if
inspired from above, came the union of both in that immortal
anthem, "Home, Sweet Home." The solemn and swelling
cadence of these old familiar notes was caught by both armies,
and their joint and loud acclamations made the climax of one of
the most inspiring scenes ever witnessed in war.

The talking and joking, the trading and "swapping," between
the pickets and between the lines became so prevalent before
the war closed as to cause no comment and attract no special
attention, except when the intercourse led the commanding
officers to apprehend that important information might be
unwittingly imparted to the foe. On the Rapidan and
Rappahannock, into which the former emptied, this rollicking sort
of intercourse would have been alarming in its intimacy but for
the perfect confidence which the officers of both sides had in
their men. Even officers on the opposite banks of this narrow
stream would now and then declare a truce among themselves,
in order that they might bathe in the little river. Where the water
was shallow they would wade in and meet each other in the
center and shake hands, and "swap" newspapers and barter
Southern tobacco for Yankee coffee. Where the water was
deep, so that they could not wade in and "swap," they sent the
articles of traffic across in miniature boats, laden on the Southern
shore with tobacco and sailed across to the Union side. These
little boats were unloaded by the Union soldiers, reloaded, and
sent back with Yankee coffee for the Confederates. This
extraordinary international commerce was carried on to such an
extent that the commanders of both armies concluded it was best
to stop it. General Lee sent for me on one occasion and
instructed me to break up the traffic. Riding along the lines, as I
came suddenly and unexpectedly around the point of a hill upon
one of the Confederate posts, I discovered an

unusual commotion and confusion. I asked: "What is the matter
here? What is all this confusion about?"

"Nothing at all, sir. It 's all right here, general."

I expressed some doubt about its being all right, when the
spokesman for the squad attempted to connect some absurd
explanation as to their effort to get ready to "present arms" to
me as I came up. Of course I was satisfied that this was not
true; but I could see no evidence of serious irregularity. As I
started, however, I looked back and discovered the high weeds
on the bank shaking, and wheeling my horse, I asked:

"What 's the matter with those weeds?"

"Nothing at all, sir," he declared; but I ordered him to break
the weeds down. There I found a soldier almost naked. I
asked:

"Where do you belong?"

"Over yonder," he replied, pointing to the Union army on the
other side.

"And what are you doing here, sir?"

"Well, general," he said, "I did n't think it was any harm to
come over and see the boys just a little while."

"What boys?" I asked.

"These Johnnies," he said.

"Don't you know, sir, that there is war going on in this
country?" I asked.

"Yes, general," he replied; "but we are not fighting now."

The fact that a battle was not then in progress given as an
excuse for social visiting between opposing lines was so absurd
that it overturned my equilibrium for the moment. If my men
could have known my thoughts they would have been as much
amused at my discomfiture as I was at the Union visitor's
reasoning. An almost irresistible impulse to laugh outright was
overcome, however, by the necessity for maintaining my official
dignity. My instructions from General Lee had been to

break up that traffic and intercourse; and the slightest lowering
of my official crest would have been fatal to my mission. I
therefore assumed the sternest aspect possible under the
circumstances, and ordered the Union soldier to stand up; and I
said to him: "I am going to teach you, Sir, that we are at war.
You have no rights here except as prisoner of war, and I am
going to have you marched to Richmond, and put you in prison."

This terrible threat brought my own men quickly and
vigorously to his defense, and they exclaimed: "Wait a minute,
general. Don't send this man to prison. We invited him over
here, and we promised to protect him, and if you send him
away it will just ruin our honor."

The object of my threat had been accomplished. I had badly
frightened the Northern guest and his Southern hosts. Turning to
the scantily clad visitor, I said:

"Now, Sir, if I permit you to go back to your own side, will
you solemnly promise me, on the honor of a soldier, that - - -" But
without waiting for me to finish my sentence, and with an
emphatic "Yes, Sir," he leaped like a bullfrog into the river and
swam back.

I recall several incidents which do not illustrate precisely the
same elements of character, but which show the heroism found
on both sides, of which I know few, if any, parallels in history.
After the battle of Sharpsburg, there was sent to me as an aide
on my staff a very young soldier, a mere stripling. He was at that
awkward, gawky age through which all boys seem to pass. He
bore a letter, however, from the Hon. Thomas Watts, of
Alabama, who was the Attorney-General of the Confederate
States, and who assured me that this lad had in him all the
essentials of a true soldier. It was not long before I found that
Mr. Watts had not mistaken the mettle of his young friend,
Thomas G. Jones. Late one evening, near sunset, I directed
Jones to carry a message from me to General Lee or to my
immediate

superior. The route was through pine thickets and along dim
roads or paths not easily followed. The Union pickets were
posted at certain points in these dense woods; but Jones felt
sure that he could go through safely. Alone on horseback he
started on his hazardous ride. Darkness overtook him before he
had emerged from the pine thicket, and he rode into a body of
Union pickets, supposing them to be Confederates. There were
six men on that post. They seized the bridle of Jones's horse,
levelled their rifles at him, and ordered him to dismount. As there
was no alternative, one can imagine that Jones was not slow in
obeying the order. His captors were evidently new recruits, for
they neglected to deprive him of the six-shooter at his belt. Jones
even then had in him the oratorical power which afterward won
for him distinction at the bar and helped to make him governor of
the great State of Alabama. He soon engaged his captors in the
liveliest conversation, telling them anecdotes and deeply enlisting
their interest in his stories. The night was cold, and before
daylight Jones adroitly proposed to the "boys" that they should
make a fire, as there was no reason for shivering in the cold with
plenty of pine sticks around them. The suggestion was at once
accepted, and Jones began to gather sticks. The men, unwilling
for him to do all the work, laid down their guns and began to
share in this labor. Jones saw his opportunity, and burning with
mortification at his failure to carry through my message, he
leaped to the pile of guns, drew his revolver, and said to the men:
"I can kill every one of you before you can get to me. Fall into
line. I will put a bullet through the first man who moves toward
me!" He delivered those six prisoners at my headquarters.

I do not now recall the name of the Confederate who was
selected, on account of his conspicuous courage, as the
color-bearer of his regiment, and who vowed as he

received the flag that he would never surrender it. At Gaines's
Mill he fell in the forefront of the fight with a mortal wound
through his body. Raising himself on his elbow, he quietly tore his
battle-flag from the staff, folded it under him, and died upon it.

At Big Falls, North Carolina, there lived in 1897 a one-armed
soldier whose heroism will be cited by orators and poets as long
as heroism is cherished by men. He was a color-bearer of his
regiment, the Thirteenth North Carolina. In a charge during the
first day's battle at Gettysburg, his right arm, with which he bore
the colors, was shivered and almost torn from its socket.
Without halting or hesitating, he seized the falling flag in his left
hand, and, with his blood spouting from the severed arteries and
his right arm dangling in shreds at his side, he still rushed to the
front, shouting to his comrades: "Forward, forward!" The name
of that modest and gallant soldier is W. F. Faucette.

At Gettysburg a Union color-bearer of one of General
Barlow's regiments, which were guarding the right flank of
General Meade's army, exhibited a similar dauntless devotion in
defence of his colors. As my command charged across the
ravine and up its steep declivity, along which were posted the
Union troops, the fight became on portions of the line a
hand-to-hand struggle. This lion-hearted color-bearer of a Union
regiment stood firmly in his place, refusing to fly, to yield his
ground, or to surrender his flag. As the Confederates crowded
around him and around the stalwart men who still stood firmly by
him, he became engaged in personal combat with the color-bearer
of one of my Georgia regiments. What his fate was I do
not now recall, but I trust and believe that his life was spared.

I sincerely pity the man who calls himself an American and
who does not find in these exhibitions of American manhood on
either side, a stimulant to his pride as an

American citizen and a support to his confidence in the
American Republic. The true patriot must necessarily feel a
glow of sincere pride in the record of the Republic's great and
heroic sons from every section. There is no inconsistency,
however, between a special affection for one's birthplace and a
general love for one's entire country. There is nothing truer than
that the love of the home is the unit, and that the sum of these
units is aggregated patriotism. What would be thought of the
patriotism of a son of New England or of the Old Dominion
whose heart did not warm at the mention of Plymouth Rock or
of Jamestown?

An incident in the war experience of General Newton M.
Curtis, a leading and influential Republican member of Congress
from New York, is worthy of record. A finer specimen of
physical manhood it would be difficult to find. Six feet six inches
in height, erect as the typical Indian, he weighs two hundred and
thirty-two pounds; but if he were six feet twelve and weighed
twice as much his body would not be big enough to contain the
great soul which inhabits it. He had one eye shot out by a
Confederate bullet, but if he had lost both his lofty spirit would
have seen as clearly as now that the war was fought in defence
of inherited belief, and that when it ended the Union was more
closely cemented than ever.

Near Fairfax Court-House, during the war in that portion of
Virginia which had been devastated by both armies, biting want
necessarily came to many families near the border, particularly
to those whose circumstances made it impossible for them to
remove to a distant part of the State. From within the Union
lines there came into the Union camps, one chilly day, a Virginia
lady. She was weak and pale and thinly clad, and rode an
inferior horse, with a faithful old negro as her only escort. She
had come to solicit from the commissary department of the
Union army supplies with which

to feed her household. The orders to the commissary department
in the field were necessarily stringent. The supplies did not
belong to the officer in charge, but were the property of the
government. That officer, therefore, had no right to donate
anything even to the most deserving case of charity, except
according to the orders; and the orders required all applicants for
supplies to take the oath of allegiance to the United States before
such supplies could be furnished. This hungry and wan woman
was informed that she could have the necessaries, for which she
asked upon subscribing to that oath. What was she to do? Her
kindred, her husband and son, were soldiers in the Confederate
army. If she refused to take the oath, what would become of her
and those dependent upon her? If she took the oath, what was to
become of her own convictions and her loyalty to the cause of
those she loved? It is not necessary to say that her sense of duty
and her fidelity to the Southern cause triumphed. Sad and hungry,
she turned away, resolved to suffer on. But General Curtis was
in that camp. He had no power to change the orders, and no
disposition to change them, and he would have scorned to violate
a trust; for there was no braver or more loyal officer in the Union
army. He had, however, in his private purse some of the money
which he had earned as a soldier, and he illustrated in his
character that native knighthood which ennobles its possessor
while protecting, befriending, and blessing the weak or
unfortunate. It is enough to add that this brave and suffering
Virginia woman did not leave the Union camp empty-handed. I
venture the opinion that General Curtis would not exchange the
pleasure which that act gave him at the time, and has given him
for the thirty years since, for the amount of money expended
multiplied many times over.

the city of Knoxville, Tennessee, there occurred an incident
equally honorable to the sentiment and spirit of Confederate and
Federal. During a recent visit to that city, a party representing
both sides in that engagement accompanied me to the great fort
which General Longstreet's forces assailed but were unable to
capture. These representatives of both armies united in giving me
the details of the incident. The Southern troops had made a bold
assault upon the fort. They succeeded in reaching it through a
galling fire, and attempted to rush up its sides, but were beaten
back by the Union men, who held it. Then in the deep ditch
surrounding the fortress and at its immediate base, the
Confederates took their position. They were, in a measure,
protected from the Union fire; but they could neither climb into
the fort nor retreat, except at great sacrifice of life. The sun
poured its withering rays upon them and they were famishing
with thirst. A bold and self-sacrificing young soldier offered to
take his life in his hands and canteens on his back and attempt to
bring water to his fainting comrades. He made the dash for life
and for water, and was unhurt; but the return--how was that to be
accomplished? Laden with the filled and heavy canteens, he
approached within range of the rifles in the fort and looked
anxiously across the intervening space. He was fully alive to the
fact that the chances were all against him; but, determined to
relieve his suffering comrades or die in the effort, he started on
his perilous run for the ditch at the fort. The brave Union soldiers
stood upon the parapet with their rifles in hand. As they saw this
daring American youth coming, with his life easily at their
disposal, they stood silently contemplating him for a moment.
Then, realizing the situation, they fired at him a tremendous
volley--not of deadly bullets from their guns, but of enthusiastic
shouts from their throats. If the annals of war record any
incident between hostile

armies which embodies a more beautiful and touching tribute
by the brave to the brave, I have never seen it.

And now what is to be said of these incidents? How much
are the few recorded in this chapter worth? To the generations
that are to follow, what is their value and the value of the tens of
thousands which ought to be chronicled? Do they truly indicate
that the war did lift the spirit of the people to better things? Was
it really fought in defense of cherished convictions, and did it
bury in its progress the causes of sectional dissensions? Did it
develop a higher manhood in the men, and did it reveal in glorious
light the latent but ever-living heroism of our women? The
heroines of Sparta who gave their hair for bow-strings have been
immortalized by the muse of history; but what tongue can speak
or pen indite a tribute worthy of that Mississippi woman who
with her own hands applied the torch to more than half a million
dollars' worth of cotton, reducing herself to poverty, rather than
have that cotton utilized against her people? The day will come,
and I hope and believe it is rapidly approaching, when in all the
sections will be seen evidences of appreciation of these inspiring
incidents; when all lips will unite in expressing gratitude to God
that they belong to such a race of men and women; when no
man who loves his country will be found grovelling among the
embers and ignoble passions of the past, but will aid in
developing a still nobler national life, by inviting the youth of our
country to a contemplation of the true glories of this memorable
war.

In my boyhood I witnessed a scene in nature which it now
seems to me fitly symbolizes that mighty struggle and the view
of it which I seek to present. Standing on a mountain-top, I saw
two storm-clouds lowering in the opposite horizon. They were
heavily charged with electric fires. As they rose and
approached each other they

extended their length and gathered additional blackness and fury.
Higher and higher they rose, their puffing wind-caps rolling
like hostile banners above them; and when nearing each other
the flashing lightning blazed along their front and their red bolts
were hurled into each other's bosoms. Finally in mid-heavens
they met, and the blinding flashes and fearful shocks filled my
boyish spirit with awe and terror. But God's hand was in that
storm, and from the furious conflict copious showers were
poured upon the parched and thirsty earth, which refreshed
and enriched it.

CHAPTER X

RETROSPECTIVE VIEW OF LEADERS AND EVENTS

Confederate victories up to the winter of 1863--Southern confidence in
ultimate independence--Progress of Union armies in the West--Fight for the
control of the Mississippi--General Butler in possession of New Orleans--
The new era in naval construction--Significance of the battle of the Monitor
and Merrimac--Great leaders who had come into prominence in both armies--
The death of Albert Sidney Johnston--General Lee the most unassuming of
great commanders.

THE next promontories on the war's highway which come into
view are Gettysburg, Vicksburg, and Chickamauga; and these
suggest a retrospective view of the entire field over which the
armies had been marching, and of the men who had been leading
them.

The battles of 1861-62 and of the winter of 1863 had left the
South still confident of success in securing her independence and
the North still fully resolved on maintaining the integrity of the
Union. In Virginia the Confederates had won important victories
at Bull Run, in the seven days' battles around Richmond, at
Harper's Ferry, with the surrender of the Union forces to
Jackson, at second Manassas, at Fredericksburg, in the Valley,
and at Chancellorsville, and had claimed a drawn battle at
Sharpsburg--Antietam. Kirby Smith had marched nearly across
Kentucky, threatening Cincinnati, and success of more or less
importance had attended Southern arms in other localities.

In the West the Union arms had won at Fort Donelson, Fort
Henry, and in the battle for the possession of

eastern Kentucky, where the Confederate commander
Zollicoffer was killed, and the Union commander, George H.
Thomas, won his first great victory. The Confederates had
suffered severely at Pea Ridge in Arkansas, although no material
advantage was gained on either side. McCulloch, the noted
Texas ranger, fell, and the picturesque Albert Pike, with his two
thousand Indians, lent additional interest to the scene. On both
sides of the Mississippi the Union forces were advancing.
Kentucky and all northern Tennessee and Missouri and northern
Arkansas had been abandoned to Union occupation. The
possession of the Mississippi River from its source to its mouth,
and the cutting in twain of the Confederate territory, became for
the Southwest the dominating policy of the Union authorities--the
logical sequence of which would be to cut off Confederate
food-supplies from Texas and the trans-Mississippi. The success
of this policy was becoming assured by rapidly recurring and
decisive blows. Island Number Ten, above Memphis, fell, forcing
the evacuation of Fort Pillow and of Memphis, thus breaking
Confederate control of this great waterway at every point north
of Vicksburg. Farragut, the brilliant admiral, had battered his way
through Confederate gunboats and forts from the Mississippi's
mouth to New Orleans. This foremost genius of the Union navy,
whose father was a friend of Andrew Jackson's, and whose
mother was a North Carolina woman, had learned his first lesson
in heroism from this Southern mother as she stood with uplifted
axe in the door of their cabin home, defending her children from
the red savages of the mountains.

General Benjamin F. Butler, who had advocated the
nomination of Jefferson Davis for President in the Charleston
Convention (1860), had marched his troops into New Orleans
and taken possession of the city. Along the Atlantic coast, point
after point held by Confederates

was falling before the mighty naval armament of the
United States. No Confederate navy existed to dispute its
progress. General Burnside, in his expedition to North Carolina,
had captured Fort Macon and Newbern. The cities of
Fernandina and Jacksonville, Florida, were unable to stand
against the fire from the fleet of Commodore Dupont. In
Hampton Roads, Virginia, had occurred the first battle of
perfected ironclads in the world's history, and one of the most
furious in the annals of naval engagements. The Confederate
Virginia and the United States Monitor in a few days had
revolutionized the theories of scientific seamen, and made the
ironclad the future monarch of the water. The United States
frigate Merrimac, which had been scuttled and sunk by its
former crew, was raised from its deep grave by the
Confederates and remodelled under the direction of Captain J.
M. Brooke, of Virginia. It was covered with a sloping roof of
railroad iron, plastered over with plumbago and tallow, and
rechristened Virginia. From this roof of greased iron the
heaviest solid shot of the most powerful guns glanced like
india-rubber balls from a mound of granite and whizzed harmlessly into
the air. With its steel-pointed prow the Virginia crashed into the
side of the United States war-ship Cumberland, tearing a huge
hole through which the rushing waters poured into her hull,
carrying her to the bottom with the gallant Federals who had
manned her. Under the belching fires of this floating volcano,
with its crater near the water's surface and its base-line three
feet below it, the United States frigate Congress was forced to
surrender. The most thrilling scene, however, in this great
struggle of naval monsters, was that witnessed when the Union
ironclad Monitor, designed by Captain John Ericsson, engaged
the ironclad Virginia at close quarters. The pointed beak of the
Virginia could make no impression upon the armor of the
Monitor. The heaviest shots

of each bounded off from the sides of the other, doing no
practical damage even when at closest range. These two
heralds of the new era in naval construction and naval battles
were buried at last in that element the warfare upon which they
had completely revolutionized--the Virginia in the James River,
the Monitor in the Atlantic off Hatteras.

The great military leaders on the two sides were just beginning
to attract the attention of their countrymen and to fix the gaze of
Christendom. George H. Thomas, who was regarded by
Confederate officers as one of the ablest of the Union
commanders, was steadily building that solid reputation the
general recognition of which found at last popular expression in
the sobriquet, "Rock of Chickamauga"--a title resembling that
conferred upon Jackson at Bull Run, and for a similar service.
Sheridan, who afterward became the most famous cavalryman
of the North, was beginning to win the confidence of his
commanders and of his Northern countrymen. McDowell, who
was the classmate and friend at West Point of his opponent
Beauregard, and whose ability as a soldier was recognized by
Confederate leaders, had been defeated at Bull Run, the first
great battle of the war, and had been supplanted by McClellan. It
was my privilege to confer with General McClellan during the
exciting and momentous period preceding the inauguration of
President Hayes, and he impressed me then, as he had
impressed his people in 1862, as a man of great personal
magnetism and vivacious intellect. After the seven days' battles
around Richmond, McClellan was replaced by General John
Pope. That officer, who had ingloriously failed to make good his
prophecy that his army would henceforth look only upon the
backs of the enemy, and who, contrary to his prediction, found
that even he must consider "lines of retreat" at second
Manassas, had been sent to another field of service when
General

McClellan was reinstated in command. President Lincoln,
however, is said to have soon desired greater activity, and to
have wittily suggested that if General McClellan had no special
use for the army he would like to borrow it. Whether this
characteristic suggestion was ever made by the President or not,
it is certain that the army was later intrusted to General Burnside,
with whom I served afterward in the Senate, and who was
respected by all in that chamber for his stainless record as
legislator and exalted character as man and patriot. General
Burnside, after his defeat by Lee at Fredericksburg, had at his
own request been relieved of the command of the army. General
Hooker, his successor, who as long as the war lasted fought with
heroism and devotion, and after it ended entertained his Southern
friends with the lavish hand of a prince, had lost the great battle
of Chancellorsville. Although this admirable officer, by his
devotion to his duties as commander, had so enhanced the
efficiency of his army in numbers and discipline that he felt
justified in pronouncing it "the finest army on the planet," he also
had asked to be relieved of chief command because of some
conflict of authority. His successor was General George Gordon
Meade, of whom I shall have more to say in another connection.

The reputations of Sherman and of Grant were now eclipsing
those of other commanders. General Sherman, with Memphis as
his base, was threatening to overrun the Confederate States on
the east bank of the Mississippi, while Stephen D. Lee, a brilliant
campaigner, pronounced by competent authority one of the most
effective commanders on the Confederate side, was throwing
his little army across General Sherman's lines of advance and
retarding his progress. Sherman, however, was advancing and
laying the foundations upon which he was to build the imposing
structure of his future fame.

Grant was piling victory upon victory and steadily mounting to
the heights to which destiny and his country were calling him.

On the Confederate side, a great light had gone out when
Albert Sidney Johnston fell. In comparative youth he had
rendered signal service to Texas in her struggle for
independence. In the war with Mexico he had evoked from "Old
Rough and Ready"--Zachary Taylor--the commanding general,
praises that were neither few nor meagre. In Utah he had been
the government's faithful friend and strong right arm. A
Kentuckian by birth, he had in his veins some of the best of
American blood. Like Washington and Lee, he combined those
singularly attractive qualities which inspired and held the love
and confidence of his soldiers, while commanding the respect
and admiration of the sages of West Point. In him more than in
any other man at that period were centred the hopes of the
Southern people. He fell in the morning of his career, leading his
steady lines through the woods at Shiloh, and in the very hour of
apparently assured victory. As the rich life-current ebbed
through the severed artery, he closed his eyes on this scene of
his last conflict, confident of his army's triumph and with the
exultant shouts of his advancing legions sounding a requiem in
his ears.

The immediate successor of Albert Sidney Johnston was
Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard, who was an officer of
ability and sincerely patriotic. Had circumstances favored it, he
would have found the broadest field for usefulness at some point
where his great skill as an engineer could have been utilized.
During the initiative period of the war, prior to the first great
battle of Bull Run, it was my privilege to serve under General
Beauregard and to learn something of those cheery, debonair
characteristics which helped to make him the idol of the
vivacious creoles of Louisiana. After the war a Virginian,

an ardent admirer of General Lee, was extolling the great
commander-in-chief in a conversation with one of Beauregard's
devoted creole adherents. The Louisianian listened for a moment
to the Virginian's praise of Lee, and then replied:

"Lee--Lee! Yes, seems to me I did hear Beauregard speak
very well of Lee."

Louisiana furnished another successor to the lamented Albert
Sidney Johnston in the person of General Braxton Bragg. This
officer, who was one of President Davis's special favorites,
becoming late in the war a military adviser of the Confederate
President, was a noted artillerist, and would possibly have done
greater execution in directing the movements of field batteries,
which was a specialty, than in directing the movements of an
army or handling it in battle. General Bragg was undoubtedly a
man of ability, but his health was bad, and unfortunately his
temper was no better. His reference, though in semi-private
conversation, to one of his most prominent officers as "an old
woman," and his declaration that he had few men under him
capable of command, were in strange contrast to the confidence
felt by the country in those officers, and were especially in
contrast with the spirit of Lee in assuming for himself the
responsibility for defeat, while giving the honors of success to his
juniors. When General Bragg was indulging in these criticisms of
his officers he had under him those brilliant soldiers, the
accomplished, alert, and dashing E. C. Walthall, late United
States senator from Mississippi; Patrick Cleburne, whose warm
Irish blood and quick Irish intellect made him conspicuous in
every fight, and who in the desperate charge at Franklin,
Tennessee, was killed on the defences behind which the Union
army had been posted; and W. H. T. Walker, who as a boy had
won his spurs fighting Indians at Okeechobee, and who was
afterward desperately wounded in

Mexico, recovering, as he said, "to spite the doctors." He lost his
life at last in battle at Atlanta, and left a reputation for courage
equal to that of Ney. There was also in Bragg's army at that time
the accomplished and brave Bate, of Tennessee, who was
repeatedly wounded, and finally maimed for life, and whose old
war-horse, shot at the same time, followed his wounded owner to
the hospital tent and died at its door, moaning his farewell to that
gallant master. There were also Cheatham and Polk (of whom I
have spoken in a former chapter), and a galaxy of able men of
whom I would gladly write. There were also with Bragg the
knightly cavalryman Joseph Wheeler, and N. B. Forrest, the
"wizard of the saddle," who was one of the unique figures of the
war, and who, in my estimation, exhibited more native untutored
genius as a cavalry leader than any man of modern times. Like
the great German emperor who thought the rules of grammar
were not made for his Majesty, Forrest did not care whether his
orders were written according to Murray or any other
grammarian, so they meant to his troops "fight on, men, and keep
fighting till I come."

Lieutenant-General Hardee was also one of Bragg's corps
commanders. This officer, who was an accomplished tactician,
had made a record which many thought indicated abilities of a
high order, fitting him for chief command of the Western Army.
Another of his corps commanders was the chivalrous John B.
Hood, who, at Atlanta, in 1864, was named by President Davis to
succeed General Joseph E. Johnston, who was removed from
chief command. In commenting on the picturesque and high-spirited
Hood a whole chapter might be consumed; but I shall
confine myself to a few observations in regard to him. As
division or corps commander, there were very few men in either
army who were superior to Hood; but his most intimate
associates and

ardent admirers in the army never regarded him as endowed
with those rare mental gifts essential in the man who was to
displace General Joseph E. Johnston. To say that he was as
brave and dashing as any officer of any age would be the merest
commonplace tribute to such a man; but courage and dash are
not the sole or even the prime requisites of the commander of a
great army. There are crises, it is true, in battle, like that which
called Napoleon to the front at Lodi, and caused Lee to attempt
to lead his men on May 6 in the Wilderness, and again at
Spottsylvania (May 12, 1864), when the fate of the army may
demand the most daring exposure of the commander-in-chief
himself. It is nevertheless true that care and caution in handling
an army, the forethought which thoroughly weighs the
advantages and disadvantages of instant and aggressive action,
are as essential in a commander as courage in his men. In these
high qualities his battles at Atlanta and later at Franklin would
indicate that Hood was lacking. I am persuaded and have reason
to believe that General Lee thought Joseph E. Johnston's tactics
wiser, although they involved repeated retreats in husbanding the
strength and morale of his army. Bosquet said of some brilliant
episode in battle: "It is magnificent, but it is not war." Hood, like
Jackson, thought battle a delightful excitement; but Jackson, with
all his daring and apparent relish for the fray, was one of the
most cautious of men. His terrible marches were inspired largely
by his caution. Instead of hurling his troops on breastworks in
front, which might have been "magnificent," he preferred to
wage war by heavy marching in order to deliver his blow upon
the flank. His declaration that it is better to lose one hundred men
in marching than a thousand in fighting is proof positive of the
correctness of the estimate I place on his caution. Ewell once
said that he never saw one of Jackson's staff approaching
without "expecting an

order to storm the north pole"; but if Jackson had determined to
take the north pole he would have first considered whether it
could be more easily carried by assaulting in front or by turning
its flank.

Hood had lost a leg in battle, and when the amputation was
completed an attempt was made to console him by the
announcement that a civil appointment was ready for him. With
characteristic impetuosity, he replied: "No, sir; no bomb-proof
place for me. I propose to see this fight out in the field." This
undiminished ardor for military service calls to mind the many
other soldiers of the Civil War, and of all history, whose loss of
bodily activity in no way impaired their mental capacity. Ewell,
with his one leg, not only rode in battle like a cow-boy on the
plains, but in the whirlwind of the strife his brain acted with the
precision and rapidity of a Gatling gun.

General Daniel E. Sickles, of New York, who was an able
representative in Congress, continued his active and conspicuous
service in the field long after he lost the leg which was shivered
by a Confederate ball as the brave men in gray rushed up the
steep of Little Round Top at Gettysburg. The United States
Senate, since the war, has been a conspicuous arena for one-legged
Confederates. The former illustrious senators of South
Carolina, Hampton and Butler, and the combative and forceful
Berry of Arkansas, each stood upon his single leg, an able and
aggressive champion of Democratic faith; and it is certain that
the brilliant oratory of Daniel, of Virginia, is none the less
Websterian because the missile in the Wilderness mangled his
leg and maimed him for life. Marshal Saxe, who ran away from
home and joined the army at the age of twelve, and who became
one of the most famous soldiers of his day, gathered for France
and his own brow the glories of Fontenoy while he was

carried amidst his troops on a litter. The most illustrious patrician
in the Republic of Venice, the sightless hero whom Lord Byron
called "the blind old Dandolo," achieved for his country its most
brilliant naval victories. No account, however, of the mental vigor
which has distinguished many maimed soldiers would be
complete without reference to a Union soldier who, lost both
legs. My first meeting with "Corporal" Tanner, to whom I allude,
was many years ago, on the cars between Washington and
Richmond. He was on his way to the former capital of the fallen
Confederacy. The exuberance of his spirits, the cordiality of his
greeting, and the catholicity of his sentiments arrested my
attention and won my friendship at this first meeting. In the
course of the conversation I jocularly asked him if he were not
afraid to go to Richmond without a bodyguard? "Well," he said,
"I left both my legs buried in Virginia soil, and I think a man
ought to be allowed peaceably to visit his own graveyard." A
few years later I sat on a platform with Tanner before a great
audience in Cooper Institute, New York. This audience had
assembled for the purpose of considering ways and means to aid
in the erection of a Confederate Soldiers' Home in Richmond. I
had in my pocket a liberal contribution from General Grant, and
after announcing this fact, with a few additional words, I called
for Tanner as the speaker of the evening. He stood tremblingly
on the two wooden pins that served him as legs, and began by
saying: "My whole being is enlisted in this cause, from the
crown of my head down to the--as far as I go." Those who were
present at the great gathering of Confederates in the vast
assembly-hall at Richmond during the last days of June, 1895,
will not soon forget his speech on that occasion. This maimed
Union veteran, surrounded by Confederates, was pressed to the
front of the platform amidst the wildest acclamations of his

former foes. Every fibre of his body quivering with emotion,
Tanner poured into the ears and hearts of his auditors a torrent
of patriotic eloquence that evoked a demonstration such as
rarely greets any man. In his case the loss of his legs seems to
have added vigor to his brain and breadth to his heart.

The brief comments I have made upon General Hood's career
as commander of an army are in no degree disparaging to his
clear title to the gratitude of the Southern people. They are
penned by as loyal a friend as he had in the Confederate army.
No devoted Theban ever stood at the tomb of Epaminondas with
keener appreciation of his great virtues than is mine of the high
qualities of the great-hearted and heroic Hood. These views
were not withheld from General Lee when the selection of a now
commander for the Confederate army at Atlanta was in
contemplation. When President Davis asked General Lee for an
opinion as to the wisdom of removing General Johnston from the
command of that army, General Lee did me the honor, as I
presume he honored other corps commanders, to counsel with
me as to the policy of such an act. I had served under General
Johnston while he commanded the Army of Northern Virginia. I
had learned by experience and observation how he could retreat
day after day and yet retain the absolute confidence of his
officers and men, who were ready at any moment to about face,
and, with an enthusiasm born of that confidence, assume the
offensive at his command. I therefore expressed the opinion that
there was no one except General Lee himself who could take
General Johnston's place without a shock to the morale of his
troops that would greatly decrease the chances of checking
General Sherman. Hood and others were discussed, and I
ventured the suggestion that if the time should ever come for the
removal of General Johnston, it would be after he had lost and
not while he still

retained, as he clearly did, the enthusiastic confidence of his
army, from the commanders of corps to the privates in the ranks.
I may here remark that General Lee was perhaps the most
unassuming of great commanders. Responsibilities that clearly
belonged to him as a soldier he met promptly and to the fullest
extent; but he was the last man holding a commission in the
Confederate army to assume authority about which there could
be any question. Especially was this true when such authority
was placed by the Constitution or laws in the hands of the
President. Nothing could tempt him to cross the line separating his
powers from those of the civil authorities. That line might be dim
to others, but it was clear to him. This delicacy was exhibited
again and again even during the desperate throes in the last
death-struggle of his army. I cannot be mistaken, however, as to his
opinion of the suggested removal of General Johnston and the
promotion of General Hood or any one else to the chief
command. While he avoided any direct reply to my suggestions,
he said enough to indicate his opinions. I could not forget his
expressions, and I give, I believe, the exact words he used. He
said: "General Johnston is a patriot and an able soldier. He is
upon the ground, and knows his army and its surroundings and
how to use it better than any of us." This was the extent of his
comment and ended the interview. He never again alluded to the
subject. General Lee was influenced in this case, as always, by a
possibly too extreme reluctance to assume powers vested in the
head of the government. While there was more or less complaint
and criticism of Mr. Davis's management (it could not be
otherwise during the progress of so stupendous an enterprise), the
confidence reposed in his ability and consecration was unshaken;
and General Lee heartily shared in this confidence. The
threadbare adage, "Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,"
found

a fit illustration of its truth in the experience of Jefferson Davis,
as it did in that of George Washington and of Abraham Lincoln.
In the case of Washington criticism ceased when he retired to
Mount Vernon. In the case of Abraham Lincoln all carpings and
all divisions were lost in the universal sorrow of the whole
American people when he became the victim of the murderous
bullet of an insane assassin. So Jefferson Davis when imprisoned
became the representative martyr of his whole people. Every
one of them was ready to share with him all responsibility for the
struggle, to the chief conduct of which they had called him by
their votes. I feel sure that so long as this vicarious suffering of
Mr. Davis lasted, General Johnston himself would have been
unwilling to publish any statements as to the controversy
between them, though he might have deemed such statements
necessary for his own vindication.

The strained relations between them originated in an honest
difference of opinion as to the relative rank to which General
Johnston was entitled among the five full generals. It is wholly
immaterial to my present purpose to inquire which was right.
The position of either could be sustained by forceful arguments.
From my knowledge of both President Davis and General
Johnston, I feel justified in saying that the spirit which prompted
them differed essentially from that which impelled the Duke of
Wellington and Talleyrand each to desire the first place in the
picture in which the allied sovereigns were to appear. Personal
ambition played a very small part in the conduct of the serious
enterprise in which the South was embarked. I could not fail to
be deeply concerned, as all Southerners were, as to the effect of
this alienation between the President and one of the South's
ablest commanders. Honored with the close personal friendship
of both after the war, I had abundant opportunity for learning the
peculiarities of each. That

trenchant truism of Plato: "No man governs well who wants to
govern," finds no illustration in the lives of these patriotic men.
The high positions and responsibilities of both came to them
unsought. Their characteristics were cast in similar moulds and
were of the most inflexible metal. While courteous in
intercourse, each was tenacious in holding and emphatic in
expressing convictions. The breach, therefore, once made was
never healed. President Davis wished General Johnston to
assume the offensive, with Dalton as a base of operations.
General Johnston felt that his army, which had been beaten back
from Missionary Ridge in great confusion, could not safely
inaugurate the movement. The President felt that it was his right
as constitutional head of the Confederate Government to know
when and where
his general intended to make a stand. That general, who had made
a retreat from Dalton to Atlanta in which he had lost no wagons,
no material of any description except four pieces of artillery, and
none of the enthusiastic confidence of his officers or men, with
but few killed or wounded in the almost daily skirmishes and
combats, failed to give to the government at Richmond such
information of his plans and such assurances of his hopes of
success as were expected. A man of great caution, but of
towering capabilities, General Johnston had husbanded his army's
strength and resources in this long retrograde movement so as to
make it one of the most memorable in military annals; but I think
lie should have frankly and confidently stated where he intended
to make a final stand, from which he expected most satisfactory
results. Failing to do this, he will probably be judged by history as
failing to meet in the fullest measure his duty to the President. On
the other hand, President Davis, having placed in command this
officer, who had few if any superiors in any age or in any army,
should probably have imitated the example of Louis

XV, who said to the great marshal in command of his forces
that he expected all to obey, "and I will be the first to set the
example."

In the meantime, while these repeated changes in
commanders were occurring in the Confederate Army of the
West and in the Union Army of the East, Robert E. Lee was
intrusted with supreme military control in Virginia. Once in
command, he was destined to remain to the end. Supported by
Jackson, by the two Hills and Hampton, by Longstreet and
Stuart and the junior Lees, by Ewell and Early, by Breckinridge,
Heth, Mahone, Hoke, Rodes, and Pickett; by Field and Wilcox,
by Johnson, Cobb, Evans, Kershaw, and Ramseur; by
Pendleton, Alexander, Jones, Long and Carter of the artillery,
and by a long line of officers who have left their impress upon
history, this great chieftain was concentrating largely in himself
the hopes of the Southern people.

This cursory and necessarily imperfect review of some of the
noted leaders on both sides would be still less satisfactory
without some reference to the men of the ranks who stood
behind them--or, rather, in front of them.

During the fall of 1896, on my tour in Ohio, a gallant officer of
the Union army, after hearing some reference by me to the great
debt of gratitude due the private soldiers, gave me an amusing
account of a meeting held by privates and junior officers of the
line in the Union camps. Brevet titles were being conferred upon
many officers for meritorious conduct. A series of resolutions
were passed at this meeting, with the usual whereases, by
which it was declared, as the sense of the meeting, that every
private who had bravely fought and uncomplainingly suffered
was entitled to be brevetted as corporal, every corporal as
sergeant, and every sergeant as captain. In that droll gathering
some wag proposed an additional resolution, which, with solemn
dignity, was

unanimously adopted: "Whereas, the faithful mules of the army
have worked hard without any complaint, each one of said
mules should be promoted to the rank of horse."

General Lee evidenced his appreciation of the privates when
he said to one of them who was standing near his tent, "Come
in, captain, and take a seat."

"I 'm no captain, general; I 'm nothing but a private," said
this modest soldier.

"Come in, sir," said Lee; "come in and take a seat. You ought
to be a captain."

Although playfully uttered, these simple words reflected the
real sentiment of the great chieftain. It is almost literally true that
the intelligent privates in both the Confederate and Union armies
were all competent to hold minor commissions after one year's
service. They acquired well-defined opinions as to the wisdom
and object of great movements.

No language would be too strong or eulogy too high to
pronounce upon the privates who did their duty during that long
and dreadful war, who manfully braved its dangers, patiently
endured its trials, cheerfully obeyed the orders; who were ready
to march and to suffer, to fight and to die, without once calling in
question the wisdom of the orders or the necessity for the
sacrifice.

CHAPTER XI

GETTYSBURG

Why General Lee crossed the Potomac--The movement into Pennsylvania--
Incidents of the march to the Susquehanna--The first day at Gettysburg--
Union forces driven back--The key of the position--Why the Confederates
did not seize Cemetery Ridge--A defence of General Lee's strategy--The
fight at Little Round Top--The immortal charge of Pickett's men--General
Meade's deliberate pursuit--Lee's request to be relieved.

FROM Gettysburg to Appomattox; from the zenith of assurance
to the nadir of despair; from the compact ranks, boundless
confidence, and exultant hopes of as proud and puissant an
army as was ever marshalled--to the shattered remnants, withered
hopes, and final surrender of that army--such is the track to be
followed describing the Confederacy's declining fortunes and
ultimate death. No picture can be drawn by human hand vivid
enough to portray the varying hues, the spasmodic changes, the
rapidly gathering shadows of the scenes embraced in the
culminating period of the great struggle.

A brief analysis of the reasons for General Lee's crossing of
the Potomac is now in order. In the logistics of defensive war,
offensive movements are often the wisest strategy. Voltaire has
somewhere remarked that "to subsist one's army at the expense
of the enemy, to advance on their own ground and force them to
retrace their steps--thus rendering strength useless by skill--is
regarded as one of the masterpieces of military art."

concisely and clearly descriptive of General Lee's purposes in
crossing the Potomac, both in '62 and '63. It must be added,
however, that while the movement into Maryland in 1862, and
into Pennsylvania in 1863, were each defensive in design, they
differed in some particulars as to the immediate object which
General Lee hoped to accomplish. Each sought to force the
Union army to retrace its steps; "each sought to render strength
useless by skill"; but in 1862 there was not so grave a necessity
for subsisting his army on Union soil as in 1863. The movement
into Maryland was of course a more direct threat upon
Washington. Besides, at that period there was still a prevalent
belief among Southern leaders that Southern sentiment was
strong in Maryland, and that an important victory within her
borders might convert the Confederate camps into
recruiting-stations, and add materially to the strength of Lee's army. But
the Confederate graves which were dug in Maryland's soil vastly
outnumbered the Confederate soldiers recruited from her
citizens. It would be idle to speculate as to what might have been
the effect of a decisive victory by Lee's forces at South
Mountain, or Boonsboro, or Antietam (Sharpsburg). The
poignancy of disappointment at the small number recruited for
our army was intensified by the recognition of the splendid
fighting qualities of Maryland soldiers who had previously joined
us.

The movement into Pennsylvania in 1863 was also, in part at
least, a recruiting expedition. We did not expect, it is true, to
gather soldiers for our ranks, but beeves for our commissary.
For more than two years the effort to fill the ranks of the
Southern armies had alarmingly reduced the ranks of Southern
producers, with no appreciable diminution in the number of
consumers. Indeed, the consumers had materially increased; for
while we were not then seeking to encourage Northern
immigration, we had a large number of visitors from

that and other sections, who were exploring the country
under such efficient guides as McClellan, Hooker, Grant,
Sherman, Thomas, and others. We had, therefore, much
need of borrowing supplies from our neighbors beyond
the Potomac. The bill of fare of some commands was
already very short and by no means appetizing. General
Ewell, having exhausted the contents of his larder,
thought to replenish it from the surrounding country by
a personal raid, and returned after a long and dusty hunt
with a venerable ox, which would not have made a morsel,
on division, for one per cent. of his command. Ewell's
ox had on him, however, that peculiar quality of flesh
which is essential in feeding an army on short rations.
It was durable--irreducible.

The whole country in the Wilderness and around
Chancellorsville, where both Hooker's and Lee's armies had
done some foraging, and thence to the Potomac, was well-nigh
exhausted. This was true, also, of a large portion of the Piedmont
region and of the Valley of Virginia beyond the Blue Ridge
Mountains; while the lower valley, along the Shenandoah, had
long been the beaten track and alternate camping-ground of both
Confederate and Union armies. It had contributed to the support
of both armies until it could contribute no more. How to subsist,
therefore, was becoming a serious question. The hungry hosts of
Israel did not look across Jordan to the vine-clad hills of Canaan
with more longing eyes than did Lee's braves contemplate the
yellow grain-fields of Pennsylvania beyond the Potomac.

Again, to defend Richmond by threatening Washington and
Baltimore and Philadelphia was perhaps the most promising
purpose of the Confederate invasion. Incidentally, it was hoped
that a defeat of the Union army in territory so contiguous to
these great cities would send gold to such a premium as to cause
financial panic in the commercial centres, and induce the great

business interests to demand that the war should cease. But the
hoped-for victory, with its persuasive influence, did not
materialize. Indeed, the presence of Lee's army in Pennsylvania
seemed to arouse the North to still greater efforts, as the
presence of the Union armies in the South had intensified, if
possible, the decision of her people to resist to the last extremity.

The appearance of my troops on the flank of General
Meade's army during the battle of Gettysburg was not our first
approach into that little city which was to become the turning-point
in the Confederacy's fortunes. Having been detached from
General Lee's army, my brigade had, some days prior to the
great battle, passed through Gettysburg on our march to the
Susquehanna. Upon those now historic hills I had met a small
force of Union soldiers, and had there fought a diminutive battle
when the armies of both Meade and Lee were many miles
away. When, therefore, my command--which penetrated
farther, I believe, than any other Confederate infantry into the
heart of Pennsylvania--was recalled from the banks of the
Susquehanna to take part in the prolonged and stupendous
struggle, I expressed to my staff the opinion that if the battle
should be fought at Gettysburg, the army which held the heights
would probably be the victor. The insignificant encounter I had
had on those hills impressed their commanding importance upon
me as nothing else could have done.

The Valley of Pennsylvania, through which my command
marched from Gettysburg to Wrightsville on the Susquehanna,
awakened the most conflicting emotions. It was delightful to look
upon such a scene of universal thrift and plenty. Its broad grain-fields,
clad in golden garb, were waving their welcome to the
reapers and binders. Some fields were already dotted over with
harvested shocks. The huge barns on the highest grounds meant
to my sore-footed marchers a mount, a

ride, and a rest on broad-backed horses. On every side, as far
as our alert vision could reach, all aspects and conditions
conspired to make this fertile and carefully tilled region a
panorama both interesting and enchanting. It was a type of the
fair and fertile Valley of Virginia at its best, before it became
the highway of armies and the ravages of war had left it wasted
and bare. This melancholy contrast between these charming
districts, so similar in other respects, brought to our Southern
sensibilities a touch of sadness. In both these lovely valleys
were the big red barns, representing in their
silent dignity the independence of their owners. In both were the
old-fashioned brick or stone mansions, differing in style of
architecture and surroundings as Teutonic manners and tastes
differ from those of the Cavalier. In both were the broad green meadows with
luxuriant grasses and crystal springs.

One of these springs impressed itself on my memory
by its great beauty and the unique uses to which its
owner had put it. He was a staid and laborious farmer
of German descent. With an eye to utility, as well
as to the health and convenience of his household, he
had built his dining-room immediately over this fountain
gushing from a cleft in an underlying rock. My
camp for the night was near by, and I accepted his invitation
to breakfast with him. As I entered the quaint
room, one half floored with smooth limestone, and the
other half covered with limpid water bubbling clear and
pure from the bosom of Mother Earth, my amazement at
the singular design was perhaps less pronounced than
the sensation of rest which it produced. For many days
we had been marching on the dusty turnpikes, under a
broiling sun, and it is easier to imagine than to describe
the feeling of relief and repose which came over me as we sat
in that cool room, with a hot breakfast served from one side,
while from the other the frugal housewife

We entered the city of York on Sunday morning. A
committee, composed of the mayor and prominent citizens, met
my command on the main pike before we reached the corporate
limits, their object being to make a peaceable surrender and ask
for protection to life and property. They returned, I think, with a
feeling of assured safety. The church bells were ringing, and the
streets were filled with well-dressed people. The appearance of
these church-going men, women, and children, in their Sunday
attire, strangely contrasted with that of my marching soldiers.
Begrimed as we were from head to foot with the impalpable
gray powder which rose in dense columns from the
macadamized pikes and settled in sheets on men, horses, and
wagons, it is no wonder that many of York's inhabitants were
terror-stricken as they looked upon us. We had been compelled
on these forced marches to leave baggage-wagons behind us,
and there was no possibility of a change of clothing, and no time
for brushing uniforms or washing the disfiguring dust from faces,
hair, or beard. All these were of the same hideous hue. The
grotesque aspect of my troops was accentuated here and there,
too, by barefooted men mounted double upon huge horses with
shaggy manes and long fetlocks. Confederate pride, to say
nothing of Southern gallantry, was subjected to the sorest trial by
the consternation produced among the ladies of York. In my
eagerness to relieve the citizens from all apprehension, I lost
sight of the fact that this turnpike powder was no respecter of
persons, but that it enveloped all alike--officers as well as
privates. Had I realized the wish of Burns, that some power
would "the giftie gie us, to see oursels as ithers see us," I might
have avoided the slight panic created by my effort to allay a
larger one. Halting on the main street, where the sidewalks

were densely packed, I rode a few rods in advance of my
troops, in order to speak to the people from my horse. As I
checked him and turned my full dust-begrimed face upon a bevy
of young ladies very near me, a cry of alarm came from their
midst; but after a few words of assurance from me, quiet and
apparent confidence were restored. I assured these ladies that
the troops behind me, though ill-clad and travel-stained, were
good men and brave; that beneath their rough exteriors were
hearts as loyal to women as ever beat in the breasts of honorable
men; that their own experience and the experience of their
mothers, wives, and sisters at home had taught them how painful
must be the sight of a hostile army in their town; that under the
orders of the Confederate commander-in-chief both private
property and non-combatants were safe; that the spirit of
vengeance and of rapine had no place in the bosoms of these
dust-covered but knightly men; and I closed by pledging to York
the head of any soldier under my command who destroyed
private property, disturbed the repose of a single home, or
insulted a woman.

As we moved along the street after this episode, a little girl,
probably twelve years of age, ran up to my horse and handed
me a large bouquet of flowers, in the centre of which was a
note, in delicate handwriting, purporting to give the numbers and
describe the position of the Union forces of Wrightsville, toward
which I was advancing. I carefully read and reread this strange
note. It bore no signature, and contained no assurance of
sympathy for the Southern cause, but it was so terse and explicit
in its terms as to compel my confidence. The second day we
were in front of Wrightsville, and from the high ridge on which
this note suggested that I halt and examine the position of the
Union troops, I eagerly scanned the prospect with my field-glasses,
in order to verify the truth of the mysterious

communication or detect its misrepresentations. There, in
full view before us, was the town, just as described, nestling on
the banks of the Susquehanna. There was the blue line of
soldiers guarding the approach, drawn up, as indicated, along an
intervening ridge and across the pike. There was the long bridge
spanning the Susquehanna and connecting the town with
Columbia on the other bank. Most important of all, there was the
deep gorge or ravine running off to the right and extending
around the left flank of the Federal line and to the river below
the bridge. Not an inaccurate detail in that note could be
discovered. I did not hesitate, therefore, to adopt its suggestion
of moving down the gorge in order to throw my command on the
flank, or possibly in the rear, of the Union troops and force them
to a rapid retreat or surrender. The result of this movement
vindicated the strategic wisdom of my unknown and--judging by
the handwriting--woman correspondent, whose note was none the
less martial because embedded in roses, and whose evident
genius for war, had occasion offered, might have made her a
captain equal to Catherine.

As I have intimated, the orders from General Lee for the
protection of private property and persons were of the most
stringent character. Guided by these instructions and by my own
impulses, I resolved to leave no ruins along the line of my march
through Pennsylvania; no marks of a more enduring character
than the tracks of my soldiers along its superb pikes. I cannot be
mistaken in the opinion that the citizens who then lived and still
live on these highways will bear me out in the assertion that we
marched into that delightful region, and then marched out of it,
without leaving any scars to mar its beauty or lessen its value.
Perhaps I ought to record two insignificant exceptions.

it was ascertained that there was no wood to be had for even
the limited amount of necessary cooking, and I was appealed to
by the men for permission to use a few rails from an old-fashioned
fence near the camp. I agreed that they might take the
top layer of rails, as the fence would still be high enough to
answer the farmer's purpose. When morning came the fence
had nearly all disappeared, and each man declared that he had
taken only the top rail! The authorized (?) destruction of that
fence is not difficult to understand! It was a case of
adherence to the letter and neglect of the spirit; but there was
no alternative except good-naturedly to admit that my men had
gotten the better of me that time.

The other case of insignificant damage inflicted by our
presence in the Valley of Pennsylvania was the application of
the Confederate "conscript law" in drafting
Pennsylvania horses into service. That law was passed by the
Confederate Congress in order to call into our ranks able-bodied
men at the South, but my soldiers seemed to think that it might
be equally serviceable for the ingathering of able-bodied horses
at the North. The trouble was that most of these horses had fled
the country or were in hiding, and the owners of the few that
were left were not submissive to Southern authority.
One of these owners, who, I believe, had not many years before
left his fatherland and was not an expert in the use of English,
attempted to save his favorite animal by a verbal combat with
my quartermaster. That officer, however, failing to understand
him, sent him to me. The "Pennsylvania Dutchman," as his class
was known in the Valley, was soon firing at me his broken
English, and opened his argument with the announcement: "You
be's got my mare." I replied, "It is not at all improbable, my
friend, that I have your mare, but the game we
are now playing is what was called in my boyhood'tit for tat' ";
and I endeavored to explain to him that the

country was at war, that at the South horses were being taken by
the Union soldiers, and that I was trying on a small scale to
balance accounts. I flattered myself that this statement of the
situation would settle the matter; but the explanation was far
more satisfactory to myself than to him. He insisted that I had
not paid for his mare. I at once offered to pay him--in
Confederate money; I had no other. This he indignantly refused.
Finally I offered to give him a written order for the price of his
mare on the President of the United States. This offer set him to
thinking. He was quite disposed to accept it, but, like a dim ray of
starlight through a rift in the clouds at night, there gradually
dawned on him the thought that there might possibly be some
question as to my authority for drawing on the President. The
suggestion of this doubt exhausted his patience, and in his
righteous exasperation, like his great countryman hurling the
inkstand at the devil, he pounded me with expletives in so furious
a style that, although I could not interpret them into English, there
was no difficulty in comprehending their meaning. The words
which I did catch and understand showed that he was making a
comparison of values between his mare and his "t'ree vifes." The
climax of his argument was in these words: "I 've been married,
sir, t'ree times, and I vood not geef dot mare for all dose
voomans."

With so sincere an admirer of woman as myself such an
argument could scarcely be recognized as forcible; but I was
also a great lover of fine horses, and this poor fellow's distress at
the loss of his favorite mare was so genuine and acute that I
finally yielded to his entreaties and had her delivered to him.

When General Early reached York a few days later, he
entered into some business negotiations with the
officials and prominent citizens of that city. I was not
advised as to
the exact character of those negotiations, but

it was rumored through that portion of the army at the time that
General Early wanted to borrow, or secure in some other way,
for the use of his troops, a certain amount of greenbacks, and
that he succeeded in making the arrangement. I learned
afterward that the only promise to repay, like that of the
Confederate notes, was at some date subsequent to the
establishment of Southern independence.

It will be remembered that the note concealed in the flowers
handed me at York had indicated a ravine down which I could
move, reaching the river not far from the bridge. As my orders
were not restricted, except to direct me to cross the
Susquehanna, if possible, my immediate object was to move
rapidly down that ravine to the river, then along its right bank to
the bridge, seize it, and cross to the Columbia side. Once across,
I intended to mount my men, if practicable, so as to pass rapidly
through Lancaster in the direction of Philadelphia, and thus
compel General Meade to send a portion of his army to the
defence of that city. This programme was defeated, first, by the
burning of the bridge, and second, by the imminent prospect of
battle near Gettysburg. The Union troops stationed at
Wrightsville had, after their retreat across it, fired the bridge
which I had hoped to secure, and had then stood in battle line on
the opposite shore. With great energy my men labored to save
the bridge. I called on the citizens of Wrightsville for buckets and
pails, but none were to be found. There was, however, no lack of
buckets and pails a little later, when the town was on fire. The
bridge might burn, for that incommoded, at the time, only the
impatient Confederates, and these Pennsylvanians were not in
sympathy with my expedition, nor anxious to facilitate the
movement of such unwelcome visitors. But when the burning
bridge fired the lumber-yards on the river's banks, and the
burning lumber fired the town, buckets

and tubs and pails and pans innumerable came from their
hiding-places, until it seemed that, had the whole of Lee's
army been present, I could have armed them with these
implements to fight the rapidly spreading flames. My men
labored as earnestly and bravely to save the town as they did to
save the bridge. In the absence of fire-engines or other
appliances, the only chance to arrest the progress of the flames
was to form my men around the burning district, with the flank
resting on the river's edge, and pass rapidly from hand to hand
the pails of water. Thus, and thus only, was the advancing, raging
fire met, and at a late hour of the night checked and conquered.
There was one point especially at which my soldiers combated
the fire's progress with immense energy, and with great difficulty
saved an attractive home from burning. It chanced to be the
home of one of the most superb women it was my fortune to
meet during the four years of war. She was Mrs. L. L. Rewalt,
to whom I refer in my lecture, "The Last Days of the
Confederacy," as the heroine of the Susquehanna. I met Mrs.
Rewalt the morning after the fire had been checked. She had
witnessed the furious combat with the flames around her home,
and was unwilling that those men should depart without receiving
some token of appreciation from her. She was not wealthy, and
could not entertain my whole command, but she was blessed
with an abundance of those far nobler riches of brain and heart
which are the essential glories of exalted womanhood.
Accompanied by an attendant, and at a late hour of the night, she
sought me, in the confusion which followed the destructive fire,
to express her gratitude to the soldiers of my command and to
inquire how long we would remain in Wrightsville. On learning
that the village would be relieved of our presence at an early
hour the following morning, she insisted that I should bring with
me to breakfast at her house as many as could find places

in her dining-room. She would take no excuse, not even the
nervous condition in which the excitement of the previous hours
had left her. At a bountifully supplied table in the early morning
sat this modest, cultured woman, surrounded by soldiers in their
worn, gray uniforms. The welcome she gave us was so gracious,
she was so self-possessed, so calm and kind, that I found myself
in an inquiring state of mind as to whether her sympathies were
with the Northern or Southern side in the pending war.
Cautiously, but with sufficient clearness to indicate to her my
object, I ventured some remarks which she could not well ignore
and which she instantly saw were intended to evoke some
declaration upon the subject. She was too brave to evade it, too
self-poised to be confused by it, and too firmly fixed in her
convictions to hesitate as to the answer. With no one present
except Confederate soldiers who were her guests, she replied,
without a quiver in her voice, but with womanly gentleness:
"General Gordon, I fully comprehend you, and it is due to myself
that I candidly tell you that I am a Union woman. I cannot afford
to be misunderstood, nor to have you misinterpret this simple
courtesy. You and your soldiers last night saved my home from
burning, and I was unwilling that you should go away without
receiving some token of my appreciation. I must tell you,
however, that, with my assent and approval, my husband is a
soldier in the Union army, and my constant prayer to Heaven is
that our cause may triumph and the Union be saved."

No Confederate left that room without a feeling of profound
respect, of unqualified admiration, for that brave and worthy
woman. No Southern soldier, no true Southern man, who reads
this account will fail to render to her a like tribute of
appreciation. The spirit of every high-souled Southerner was
made to thrill over and over again at the evidence around him of
the more

than Spartan courage, the self-sacrifices and devotion, of
Southern women, at every stage and through every trial of the
war, as from first to last, they hurried to the front, their brothers
and fathers, their husbands and sons. No Southern man can ever
forget the words of cheer that came from these heroic women's
lips, and their encouragement to hope and fight on in the midst of
despair. When I met Mrs. Rewalt in Wrightsville, the parting
with my own mother was still fresh in my memory. Nothing
short of death's hand can ever obliterate from my heart the
impression of that parting. Holding me in her arms, her heart
almost bursting with anguish, and the tears running down her
cheeks, she asked God to take care of me, and then said : "Go,
my son; I shall perhaps never see you again, but I commit you
freely to the service of your country." I had witnessed, as all
Southern soldiers had witnessed, the ever-increasing
consecration of those women to their cause. No language can
fitly describe their saintly spirit of martyrdom, which grew
stronger and rose higher when all other eyes could see the
inevitable end of the terrific struggle slowly but surely
approaching.

Returning from the banks of the Susquehanna, and meeting at
Gettysburg, July 1, 1863, the advance of Lee's forces, my
command was thrown quickly and squarely on the right flank of
the Union army. A more timely arrival never occurred. The
battle had been raging for four or five hours. The Confederate
General Archer, with a large portion of his brigade, had been
captured. Heth and Scales, Confederate generals, had been
wounded. The ranking Union commander on the field, General
Reynolds, had been killed, and Hancock was assigned to
command. The battle, upon the issue of which hung, perhaps,
the fate of the Confederacy, was in full blast. The Union forces,
at first driven

back, now reënforced, were again advancing and pressing back
Lee's left and threatening to envelop it. The Confederates were
stubbornly contesting every foot of ground, but the Southern left
was slowly yielding. A few moments more and the day's battle
might have been ended by the complete turning of Lee's flank. I
was ordered to move at once to the aid of the heavily pressed
Confederates. With a ringing yell, my command rushed upon the
line posted to protect the Union right. Here occurred a
hand-to-hand struggle. That protecting Union line once broken left my
command not only on the right flank, but obliquely in rear of it.
Any troops that were ever marshalled would, under like
conditions, have been as surely and swiftly shattered. There was
no alternative for Howard's men except to break and fly, or to
throw down their arms and surrender. Under the concentrated
fire from front and flank, the marvel is that any escaped. In the
midst of the wild disorder in his ranks, and through a storm of
bullets, a Union officer was seeking to rally his men for a final
stand. He, too, went down, pierced by a Minié ball. Riding
forward with my rapidly advancing lines, I discovered that brave
officer lying upon his back, with the July sun pouring its rays into
his pale face. He was surrounded by the Union dead, and his
own life seemed to be rapidly ebbing out. Quickly dismounting
and lifting his head, I gave him water from my canteen, asked his
name and the character of his wounds. He was Major-General
Francis C. Barlow, of New York, and of Howard's corps. The
ball had entered his body in front and passed out near the spinal
cord, paralyzing him in legs and arms. Neither of us had the
remotest thought that he could possibly survive many hours. I
summoned several soldiers who were looking after the wounded,
and directed them to place him upon a litter and carry him to the
shade in the rear. Before parting,

he asked me to take from his pocket a package of letters and
destroy them. They were from his wife. He had but one request
to make of me. That request was that if I should live to the end
of the war and should ever meet Mrs. Barlow, I would tell her of
our meeting on the field of Gettysburg and of his thoughts of her
in his last moments. He wished me to assure her that he died
doing his duty at the front, that he was willing to give his life for
his country, and that his deepest regret was that he must die
without looking upon her face again. I learned that Mrs. Barlow
was with the Union army, and near the battle-field. When it is
remembered how closely Mrs. Gordon followed me, it will not be
difficult to realize that my sympathies were especially stirred by
the announcement that his wife was so near him. Passing
through the day's battle unhurt, I despatched at its close, under
flag of truce, the promised message to Mrs. Barlow. I assured
her that if she wished to come through the lines she should have
safe escort to her husband's side. In the desperate encounters
of the two succeeding days, and the retreat of Lee's army, I
thought no more of Barlow, except to number him with the noble
dead of the two armies who had so gloriously met their fate. The
ball, however, had struck no vital point, and Barlow slowly
recovered, though this fact was wholly unknown to me. The
following summer, in battle near Richmond, my kinsman with the
same initials, General J. B. Gordon of North Carolina, was killed.
Barlow, who had recovered, saw the announcement of his death,
and entertained no doubt that he was the Gordon whom he had
met on the field of Gettysburg. To me, therefore, Barlow was
dead; to Barlow, I was dead. Nearly fifteen years passed before
either of us was undeceived. During my second term in the
United States Senate, the Hon. Clarkson Potter, of New York,
was a member of the House of Representatives.

He invited me to dinner in Washington to meet a General
Barlow who had served in the Union army. Potter knew nothing
of the Gettysburg incident. I had heard that there was another
Barlow in the Union army, and supposed, of course, that it was
this Barlow with whom I was to dine. Barlow had a similar
reflection as to the Gordon he was to meet. Seated at Clarkson
Potter's table, I asked Barlow: "General, are you related to the
Barlow who was killed at Gettysburg?" He replied: "Why, I am
the man, sir. Are you related to the Gordon who killed me?" "I
am the man, sir," I responded. No words of mine can convey
any conception of the emotions awakened by those startling
announcements. Nothing short of an actual resurrection from the
dead could have amazed either of us more. Thenceforward, until
his untimely death in 1896, the friendship between us which was
born amidst the thunders of Gettysburg was greatly cherished by
both.

No battle of our Civil War--no battle of any war--more forcibly
illustrates the truth that officers at a distance from the field
cannot, with any wisdom, attempt to control the movements of
troops actively engaged. On the first day neither General Early
nor General Ewell could possibly have been fully cognizant of
the situation at the time I was ordered to halt. The whole of that
portion of the Union army in my front was in inextricable
confusion and in flight. They were necessarily in flight, for my
troops were upon the flank and rapidly sweeping down the lines.
The firing upon my men had almost ceased. Large bodies of the
Union troops were, throwing down their arms and surrendering,
because in disorganized and confused masses they were wholly
powerless either to check the movement or return the fire. As
far down the lines as my eye could reach the Union troops were
in retreat. Those at a distance were

still resisting, but giving ground, and it was only necessary for
me to press forward in order to insure the same results which
invariably follow such flank movements.
In less than half an hour my troops would have swept up and
over those hills, the possession of which was of such momentous
consequence. It is not surprising, with a full realization of the
consequences of a halt, that I should have refused at first to
obey the order. Not until the third or fourth order of the most
peremptory character reached me did I obey. I think I should
have risked the consequences of disobedience even then but for
the fact that the order to halt was accompanied with the
explanation that General Lee, who was several miles away, did
not wish to give battle at Gettysburg. It is stated on the highest
authority that General Lee said, sometime before his death, that
if Jackson had been there he would have won in this battle a
great and possibly decisive victory.

The Rev. J. William Jones, D.D., writing of this statement of
General Lee's, uses these words: "General Lee made that
remark to Professor James J. White and myself in his office in
Lexington one day when we chanced to go in as he was reading
a letter making some inquiries of him about Gettysburg. He said,
with an emphasis that I cannot forget, and bringing his hand
down on the table with a force that made things rattle:'If I had
had Stonewall Jackson at Gettysburg, I would have won that
fight, and a complete victory there would have given us
Washington and Baltimore, if not Philadelphia, and would have
established the independence of the Confederacy.' "

No soldier in a great crisis ever wished more ardently for a
deliverer's hand than I wished for one hour of Jackson when I
was ordered to halt. Had he been there, his quick eye would
have caught at a glance the entire situation, and instead of
halting me he would have urged

me forward and have pressed the advantage to the utmost,
simply notifying General Lee that the battle was on and he had
decided to occupy the heights. Had General Lee himself been
present this would undoubtedly have been done. General Lee, as
he came in sight of the battle-field that afternoon, sent Colonel
Walter H. Taylor, of the staff (he makes this statement clearly
in his book, "Four Years with Lee"), with an order to General
Ewell to "advance and occupy the heights." General Ewell
replied that he would do so, and afterward explained in his
official report that he did not do so because of the report from
General William Smith that the enemy was advancing on his
flank and rear, the supposed enemy turning out to be General
Edward Johnson's Confederate division. Absent as General Lee
necessarily was, and intending to meet General Meade at
another point and in defensive battle, he would still have
applauded, when the facts were made known, the most
aggressive movements, though in conflict with his general plan.
From the situation plainly to be seen on the first afternoon, and
from facts that afterward came to light as to the position of the
different corps of General Meade's army, it seems certain that if
the Confederates had simply moved forward, following up the
advantages gained and striking the separated Union commands
in succession, the victory would have been Lee's instead of
Meade's. 1

I should state here that General Meade's army at that hour
was stretched out along the line of his march for

1 I give here the numbers engaged. The figures are taken from the highest
authorities:

FEDERAL.--Return, June 30, 1863, effective infantry and artillery (cavalry
not reported), Army of the Potomac, 84,158 (Official Records, Vol. XXVII, Part
I, p. 151). To which add cavalry (given by "Battles and Leaders" as 13,144),
making a total of 97,302.

nearly thirty miles. General Lee's was much more concentrated.
General Hancock's statement of the situation is true and
pertinent: "The rear of our troops were hurrying through the
town, pursued by Confederates. There had been an attempt to
reform some of the Eleventh Corps as they passed over
Cemetery Hill, but it had not been very successful." And yet I
was halted!

My thoughts were so harrowed and my heart so burdened by
the fatal mistake of the afternoon that I was unable to sleep at
night. Mounting my horse at two o'clock in the morning, I rode
with one or two staff officers to the red barn in which General
Ewell and General Early then had their headquarters. Much of
my time after nightfall had been spent on the front picket-line,
listening to the busy strokes of Union picks and shovels on the
hills, to the rumble of artillery wheels and the tramp of fresh
troops as they were hurried forward by Union commanders and
placed in position. There was, therefore, no difficulty in divining
the scene that would break on our view with the coming dawn. I
did not hesitate to say to both Ewell and Early that a line of
heavy earthworks, with heavy guns and ranks of infantry behind
them, would frown upon us at daylight. I expressed the opinion
that, even at that hour, two o'clock, by a concentrated and
vigorous night assault we could carry those heights, and that if
we waited till morning it would cost us 10,000 men to take them.
There was a disposition to yield to my suggestions, but

other counsels finally prevailed. Those works were never
carried, but the cost of the assault upon them, the appalling
carnage resulting from the effort to take them, far exceeded that
which I had ventured to predict.

Late in the afternoon of this first day's battle, when the firing
had greatly decreased along most of the lines, General Ewell and
I were riding through the streets of Gettysburg. In a previous
battle he had lost one of his legs, but prided himself on the
efficiency of the wooden one which he used in its place. As we
rode together, a body of Union soldiers, posted behind some
buildings and fences on the outskirts of the town, suddenly
opened a brisk fire. A number of Confederates were killed or
wounded, and I heard the ominous thud of a Minié ball as it
struck General Ewell at my side. I quickly asked: "Are you hurt,
sir?" "No, no," he replied; "I 'm not hurt. But suppose that ball
had struck you: we would have had the trouble of carrying you
off the field, sir. You see how much better fixed for a fight I am
than you are. It don't hurt a bit to be shot in a wooden leg."

Ewell was one of the most eccentric characters, and, taking
him all in all, one of the most interesting that I have ever known.
It is said that in his early manhood he had been disappointed in a
love affair, and had never fully recovered from its effects. The
fair young woman to whom he had given his affections had
married another man; but Ewell, like the truest of knights,
carried her image in his heart through long years. When he was
promoted to the rank of brigadier or major-general, he evidenced
the constancy of his affections by placing upon his staff the son
of the woman whom he had loved in his youth. The meddlesome
Fates, who seem to revel in the romances of lovers, had decreed
that Ewell should be shot in battle and become the object of
solicitude and tender nursing by this lady, who had been for
many years a widow--Mrs. Brown. Her gentle ministrations

soothed his weary weeks of suffering, a marriage ensued, and
with it came the realization of Ewell's long-deferred hope. It was
most interesting to note the change that came over the spirit of
this formerly irascible old bachelor. He no longer sympathized
with General Early, who, like himself, was known to be more
intolerant of soldiers' wives than the crusty French marshal who
pronounced them the most inconvenient sort of baggage for a
soldier to own. Ewell had become a husband, and was sincerely
devoted to Mrs. Ewell. He never seemed to realize, however,
that her marriage to him had changed her name, for he proudly
presented her to his friends as "My wife, Mrs. Brown, sir."

Whatever differences of opinion may now or hereafter exist
as to the results which might have followed a defeat of the Union
arms at Gettysburg, there is universal concurrence in the
judgment that this battle was the turning-point in the South's
fortunes. The point where Pickett's Virginians, under Kemper,
Garnett, and Armistead, in their immortal charge, swept over the
rock wall, has been appropriately designated by the Government
as "the high-water mark of the Rebellion." To the Union
commander, General George Gordon Meade, history will accord
the honor of having handled his army at Gettysburg with
unquestioned ability. The record and the results of the battle
entitle him to a high place among Union leaders. To him and to
his able subordinates and heroic men is due the credit of having
successfully met and repelled the Army of Northern Virginia in
the meridian of its hope and confidence and power. This much
seems secure to him, whether his failure vigorously to follow
General Lee and force him to another battle is justified or
condemned by the military critics of the future. General Meade's
army halted, it is true, after having achieved a victory. The
victory, however, was not of

so decisive a character as to demoralize Lee's forces. The great
Bonaparte said that bad as might be the condition of a victorious
army after battle, it was invariably true that the condition of the
defeated army was still worse. If, however, any successful
commander was ever justified in disregarding this truism of
Bonaparte's, General Meade was that commander; for a
considerable portion of Lee's army, probably one third of it, was
still in excellent fighting trim, and nearly every man in it would
have responded with alacrity to Lee's call to form a defensive
line and deliver battle.

It was my pleasure to know General Meade well after the
war, when he was the Department Commander or Military
Governor of Georgia. An incident at a banquet in the city of
Atlanta illustrates his high personal and soldierly characteristics.
The first toast of the evening was to General Meade as the
honored guest. When this toast had been drunk, my health was
proposed. Thereupon, objection was made upon the ground that it
was "too soon after the war to be drinking the health of a man
who had been fighting for four years in the Rebel army." It is
scarcely necessary to say that this remark came from one who
did no fighting in either army. He belonged to that curious class
of soldiers who were as valiant in peace as they were docile in
war; whose defiance of danger became dazzling after the danger
was past. General Meade belonged to the other class of soldiers,
who fought as long as fighting was in order, and was ready for
peace when there was no longer any foe in the field. This
chivalric chieftain of the Union forces at Gettysburg was far
more indignant at the speech of the bomb-proof warrior than I
was myself. The moment the objection to drinking my health was
suggested, General Meade sprang to his feet, and with a
compliment to myself which I shall not be expected to repeat,
and a rebuke to the objector, he held high his

glass and said, with significant emphasis: "I propose to drink,
and drink now, to my former foe, but now my friend, General
Gordon, of Georgia."

It will not be expected that any considerable space be devoted
to the unseemly controversy over those brilliant but disastrous
Confederate charges which lost the day at Gettysburg. I could
scarcely throw upon the subject any additional light nor bring to
its elucidation any material testimony not already adduced by
those who have written on the one side or the other. A sense of
justice, however, to say nothing of loyalty to Lee's memory,
impels me to submit one observation; and I confidently affirm
that nearly every soldier who fought under him will sympathize
with the suggestion. It is this: that nothing that occurred at
Gettysburg, nor anything that has been written since of that
battle, has lessened the conviction that, had Lee's orders been
promptly and cordially executed, Meade's centre on the third day
would have been penetrated and the Union army overwhelmingly
defeated. Lee's hold upon the confidence of his army was
absolute. The repulse at Gettysburg did not shake it. I recall no
instance in history where a defeated army retained in its
retreating commander a faith so complete, and gave to him
subsequent support so enthusiastic and universal.

General Longstreet is undoubtedly among the great American
soldiers who attained distinction in our Civil War; and to myself,
and, I am sure, to a large majority of the Southern people, it is a
source of profound regret that he and his friends should have
been brought into such unprofitable and ill-tempered controversy
with the friends of his immortal chieftain. 1

1 It now seems certain that impartial military critics, after thorough
investigation, will consider the following as established:

1. That General Lee distinctly ordered Longstreet to attack early the morning
of the second day, and if he had done so, two of the largest corps
of Meade's army would not have been in the fight; but Longstreet delayed the
attack until four o'clock in the afternoon, and thus lost his opportunity of
occupying Little Round Top, the key to the position, which he might have done
in the morning without firing a shot or losing a man.

2. That General Lee ordered Longstreet to attack at daybreak on the morning
of the third day, and that he did not attack until two or three o'clock in the
afternoon, the artillery opening at one.

3. That General Lee, according to the testimony of Colonel Walter Taylor,
Colonel C. S. Venable, and General A. L. Long, who were present when the order
was given, ordered Longstreet to make the attack on the last day, with the three
divisions of his corps, and two divisions of A. P. Hill's corps, and that instead of
doing so he sent fourteen thousand men to assail Meade's army in his strong
position, and heavily intrenched.

4. That the great mistake of the halt on the first day would have been repaired
on the second, and even on the third day, if Lee's orders had been vigorously
executed, and that General Lee died believing (the testimony on this point is
overwhelming) that he lost Gettysburg at last by Longstreet's disobedience
of orders.

A third of a century has passed since, with Lee's stricken but
still puissant army, I turned my back upon the field of
Gettysburg, on which nearly 40,000 Americans went down, dead
or wounded, at the hands of fellow-Americans. The
commanders-in-chief and nearly all the great actors upon it are dead. Of the
heroes who fought there and survived the conflict, a large
portion have since joined the ranks of those who fell. A new
generation has taken their places since the battle's roar was
hushed, but its thunders are still reverberating through my
memory. No tongue, nor pen, can adequately portray its
vacillating fortunes at each dreadful moment. As I write of it
now, a myriad thrilling incidents and rapidly
changing scenes, now appalling and now inspiring, rush over my
memory. I hear again the words of Barlow:
"Tell my wife that I freely gave my life for my country."
Yonder, resting on his elbow, I see the gallant young
Avery in his bloody gray uniform among his brave North
Carolinians, writing, as he dies: "Tell father that I fell with my
face to the foe." On the opposite hills, Lee and Meade,
surrounded by staff and couriers and

with glasses in hand, are surveying the intervening space. Over it
the flying shells are plunging, shrieking, bursting. The battered
Confederate line staggers, reels, and is bent back before the
furious blast. The alert Federals leap from the trenches and over
the walls and rush through this thin and wavering line. Instantly,
from the opposite direction, with deafening yells, come the
Confederates in countercharge, and the brave Federals are
pressed back to the walls. The Confederate banners sweep
through the riddled peach orchard; while farther to the Union left
on the gory wheat-field the impacted forces are locked in deadly
embrace. Across this field in alternate waves rolls the battle's
tide, now from the one side, now from the other, until the ruthless
Harvester piles his heaps of slain thicker than the grain shocks
gathered by the husbandman's scythe. Hard by is Devil's Den.
Around it and over it the deadly din of battle roars. The rattle of
rifles, the crash of shells, the shouts of the living and groans of the
dying, convert that dark woodland into a harrowing
pandemonium. Farther to the Union left, Hood, with his stalwart
Texans, is climbing the Round Tops. For a moment he halts to
shelter them behind the great boulders. A brief pause, for rest,
and to his command, "Forward!" they mount the huge rocks
reddened with blood--and Hood's own blood is soon added. He
falls seriously wounded; but his intrepid Alabamians under Law
press forward. The fiery brigades of McLaws move to his aid.
The fiercest struggle is now for the possession of Little Round
Top. Standing on its rugged summit like a lone sentinel is seen an
erect but slender form clad in the uniform of a Union officer. It is
Warren, Meade's chief of engineers. With practised eye, he sees
at a glance that, quickly seized, that rock-ribbed hill would prove a
Gibraltar amidst the whirling currents of the battle, resisting its
heaviest shocks. Staff and couriers are summoned, who swiftly

bear his messages to the Union leaders. Veterans from Hancock
and Sykes respond at a "double-quick." Around its base, along its
sides, and away toward the Union right, with the forces of Sickles
and Hancock, the gray veterans of Longstreet are in herculean
wrestle. Wilcox's Alabamians and Barksdale's Mississippians
seize a Union battery and rush on. The Union lines under
Humphreys break through a Confederate gap and sweep around
Barksdale's left. Wright's Georgians and Perry's Floridians are
hurled against Humphreys and break him in turn. Amidst the
smoke and fury, Sickles with thighbone shivered, sickens and falls
from his saddle into the arms of his soldiers. Sixty per cent. of
Hancock's veterans go down with his gallant Brigadiers Willard,
Zook, Cross, and Brooke. The impetuous Confederate leaders,
Barksdale and Semmes, fall and die, but their places are quickly
assumed by the next in command. The Union forces of Vincent
and Weed, with Hazlett's artillery, have reached the summit, but
all three are killed. The apex of Little Round Top is the point of
deadliest struggle. The day ends, and thus ends the battle. As the
last rays of the setting sun fall upon the summit, they are reflected
from the batteries and bayonets of the Union soldiers still upon it,
with the bleeding Confederates struggling to possess it. The
embattled hosts sleep upon their arms. The stars look down at
night upon a harrowing scene of pale faces all over the field, and
of sufferers in the hospitals behind the lines--an army of dead and
wounded numbering over twenty thousand.

The third day's struggle was the bloody postscript to the battle
of the first and second. There was a pause. Night had
intervened. It was only a pause for breath. Of sleep there was
little for the soldiers, perhaps none for the throbbing brains of the
great chieftains. Victory to Lee meant Southern independence.
Victory to

Meade meant an inseparable Union. The life of the Confederacy,
the unity of the Republic--these were the stakes of July 3.
Meade decided to defend; Lee resolved to assault. The decisive
blow at Meade's left centre was planned for the early morning.
The morning came and the morning passed. The Union right,
impatient at the Confederate delay, opens fire on Lee's left. The
challenge is answered by a Confederate charge under Edward
Johnson. The Union trenches are carried. Ruger's Union lines
sweep down from the heights on Johnson's left and recover these
trenches. High noon is reached, but the assault on the left centre
is still undelivered. With every moment of delay, Lee's chances
are diminishing with geometrical progression. At last the heavy
signal-guns break the fatal silence and summon the gray lines of
infantry to the charge. Pickett's Virginians are leading. The tired
veterans of Heth and Wilcox and Pettigrew move with them.
Down the long slope and up the next the majestic column
sweeps. With Napoleonic skill, Meade's artillerists turn the
converging, galling fire of all adjacent batteries upon the
advancing Confederates. The heavy Southern guns hurl their
solid shot and shell above the Southern lines and into the Union
ranks on the summit. The air quivers and the hills tremble.
Onward, still onward, the Southern legions press. Through a
tempest of indescribable fury they rush toward the crest held by
the compact Union lines. The Confederate leaders, Garnett,
Trimble, and Kemper, fall in the storm--the first dead, the others
down and disabled. On the Union side, Hancock and Gibbon are
borne bleeding to the rear. Still onward press the men in gray,
their ranks growing thinner, their lines shorter, as the living press
toward the centre to fill the great gaps left by the dead. Nearly
every mounted officer goes down. Riderless horses are flying
hither and thither. Above the battle's

roar is heard the familiar Southern yell. It proclaims fresh
hope, but false hope. Union batteries are seen to limber up, and
the galloping horses carry them to the rear. The Confederate
shout is evoked by a misapprehension. These guns are not
disabled. They do not fly before the Confederate lines from fear
of capture. It is simply to cool their heated throats. Into their
places quickly wheel the fresh Union guns. Like burning lava
from volcanic vents, they pour a ceaseless current of fire into the
now thin Confederate ranks. The Southern left is torn to
fragments. Quickly the brilliant Alexander, his ammunition almost
exhausted, flies at a furious gallop with his batteries to the
support of the dissolving Confederate infantry. Here and there
his horses and riders go down and check his artillery's progress.
His brave gunners cut loose the dead horses, seize the wheels,
whirl the guns into position, and pour the hot grape and canister
into the faces of the Federals. The Confederates rally under the
impulse, and rush onward. At one instant their gray jackets and
flashing bayonets are plainly seen in the July sun. At the next
they disappear, hidden from view as the hundreds of belching
cannon conceal and envelop them in sulphurous smoke. The
brisk west wind lifts and drives the smoke from the field,
revealing the Confederate banners close to the rock wall. Will
they go over? Look! They are over and in the Union lines. The
left centre is pierced, but there is no Union panic, no general
flight. The Confederate battle-flags and the Union banners are
floating side by side. Face to face, breast to breast, are the
hostile hosts. The heavy guns are silent. The roar of artillery has
given place to the rattle of rifles and crack of pistol-shots, as the
officers draw their side arms. The awful din and confusion of
close combat is heard, as men batter and brain each other with
clubbed muskets. The brave young Pennsylvanian, Lieutenant

Cushing, shot in both thighs, still stands by his guns. The
Confederates seize them; but he surrenders them only with his
life. One Southern leader is left; it is the heroic Armistead. He
calls around him the shattered Southern remnants. Lifting his hat
on the point of his sword, he orders "Forward!" on the second
line, and falls mortally wounded amidst the culminating fury of
Gettysburg's fires.

The collision had shaken the continent. For three days the
tumult and roar around Cemetery Heights and the Round Tops
seemed the echo of the internal commotion which ages before
had heaved these hills above the surrounding plain.

It is a great loss to history and to posterity that General Lee
did not write his own recollections as General Grant did. It was
his fixed purpose to do so for some years after the war ended.
From correspondence and personal interviews with him, I know
that he was profoundly impressed with the belief that it was his
duty to write, and he expended much time and labor in getting
the material for such a work. From his reports, which are
models of official papers, were necessarily excluded the free
and full comments upon plans, movements, men, failures, and
the reasons for such failures, as they appeared to him, and of
which he was the most competent witness. To those who knew
General Lee well, and who added to this knowledge a just
appreciation of his generous nature, the assumption by him of
entire responsibility for the failure at Gettysburg means nothing
except an additional and overwhelming proof of his almost
marvellous magnanimity. He was commander-in-chief, and as
such and in that sense he was responsible; but in that sense he
was also responsible for every act of every officer and every
soldier in his army. This, however, is not the kind of responsibility

under discussion. This is not the standard which history will
erect and by which he will be judged. If by reason of repeated
mistakes or blunders he had lost the confidence and respect of
his army, and for this cause could no longer command its cordial
and enthusiastic support, this fact would fix his responsibility
for the failure. But no such conditions appertained. As already
stated, the confidence in him before and after the battle was
boundless. Napoleon Bonaparte never more firmly held the faith
of Frenchmen, when thrones were trembling before him, than did
Lee hold the faith of his devoted followers, amidst the gloom of
his heaviest disasters.

If his plan of battle was faulty, then for this he is responsible;
but if his general plan promised success, and if there was a lack
of cheerful, prompt, and intelligent coöperation in its execution,
or if there were delays that General Lee could not foresee nor
provide against, and which delays or lack of coöperation enabled
General Meade to concentrate his reserves behind the point of
contemplated attack, then the responsibility is shifted to other
shoulders.

There was nothing new or especially remarkable in General
Lee's plans. Novelties in warfare are confined rather to its
implements than to the methods of delivering battle. To Hannibal
and Caesar, to Frederick and Napoleon, to Grant and Lee, to all
great soldiers, the plan was familiar. It was to assault along the
entire line and hold the enemy to hard work on the wings, while
the artillery and heaviest impact of infantry penetrated the left
centre. Cooperation by every part of his army was expected and
essential. However well trained and strong may be the individual
horses in a team, they will never move the stalled wagon when
one pulls forward while the other holds back. They must all pull
together, or the heavily loaded wagon will never be carried

to the top of the hill. Such coöperation at Gettysburg was
only partial, and limited to comparatively small forces.
Pressure--hard, general, and constant pressure--Meade's right
would
have called him to its defence and weakened his centre. That
pressure was only spasmodic and of short duration. Lee and his
plan could only promise success on the proviso that the
movement was both general and prompt. It was neither.
Moments in battle are pregnant with the fate of armies. When
the opportune moment to strike arrives, the blow must fall; for
the next instant it may be futile. Not only moments, but hours, of
delay occurred. I am criticising officers for the lack of complete
coöperation not for unavoidable delays. I am simply stating facts
which must necessarily affect the verdict of history. Had all the
commands designated by General Lee coöperated by a
simultaneous assault, thus preventing Meade from grouping his
troops around his centre, and had the onset upon that centre
occurred in the early morning, as intended by Lee, it requires no
partiality to see that this great commander's object would have
been assuredly achieved. That the plan involved hazard is
undoubtedly true. All battles between such troops as confronted
each other at Gettysburg are hazardous and uncertain. If the
commanders of the Confederate and Union armies had waited
for opportunities free of hazard and uncertainty, no great battle
would have been fought and the war never would have ended.
The question which history will ask is this: Was General Lee
justified in expecting success? The answer will be that, with his
experience in meeting the same Union army at Fredericksburg,
at the second Manassas, in the seven-days, battles around
Richmond, and at Chancellorsville; with an army behind him
which he believed well-nigh invincible, and which army believed
its commander well-nigh infallible; with a victory for his troops
on the first day at Gettysburg, the completeness

of which had been spoiled only by an untimely and fatal halt;
with the second day's battle ending with alternate successes and
indecisive results; and with the expectation of prompt action and
vigorous united coöperation, he was abundantly justified in
confidently expecting success.

Wellington at Waterloo and Meade at Gettysburg, each held
the highlands against his antagonist. Wellington on Mont-Saint-Jean,
and Meade on Cemetery Ridge, had the bird's-eye view of
the forces of attack. The English batteries on the plateau and the
Union batteries on Cemetery Heights commanded alike the
intervening undulations across which the charging columns must
advance. Behind Mont- Saint-Jean, to conceal Wellington's
movements from Napoleon's eye, were the woodlands of
Soignies. Behind Cemetery Ridge, to conceal Meade's
movements from the field-glasses of Lee, was a sharp declivity,
a protecting and helpful depression. As the French under
Napoleon at Waterloo, so the Confederates under Lee at
Gettysburg, held the weaker position. In both cases the assailants
sought to expel their opponents from the stronger lines. I might
add another resemblance in the results which followed. Waterloo
decreed the destiny of France, of England, of Europe.
Gettysburg, not so directly or immediately, but practically,
decided the fate of the Confederacy.

There were points of vast divergence. The armies, which met
at Waterloo were practically equal. This was not true of the
armies that met at Gettysburg.1 Napoleon's artillery far exceeded
that of Wellington. Lee's was far inferior to Meade's, in the
metal from which the

1 General Lee's army at Gettysburg, according to most reliable estimates [see
note, pp. 155 and 156], was about 60,000 or 62,000; General Meade's is placed by
different authorities at figures ranging from 82,000 to 105,000.
Appleton's Cyclopedia of American Biography places the numbers of Lee at
69,000 and Meade's between 82,000 and 84,000.

guns were moulded, as well as in number. Waterloo was a rout,
Gettysburg a repulse. Napoleon, in the ensuing panic, was a
deserted fugitive. Lee rode amidst his broken lines calmly
majestic, the idol of his followers. With no trace of sympathy for
Napoleon's selfish aims, with righteous condemnation of his
vaulting ambition, one cannot fail to realize the profound pathos
of his position on that dismal night of wildest panic and lonely
flight. Abandoned by fortune, deserted by his army, discrowned
and doomed, he is described by Hugo as having not an organized
company to comfort him, not even his faithful Old Guard to rally
around him. In Lee's army there was neither panic nor
precipitate retreat. There was no desertion of the great
commander. Around him still stood his heroic legions, with
confidence in him unshaken, love for him unabated, ready to
follow his lead and to fight under his orders to the last extremity.

General Meade evidently, perhaps naturally, expected far
greater confusion and disorganization in Lee's army, from the
terrific repulse to which it had been subjected. He wisely threw
his cavalry upon Lee's flank in order to sweep down upon the
rear and cut to pieces or capture the fragments of Southern
infantry, in case of general retreat or demoralization. As the
Union bugles sounded the charge, however, for the gallant
horsemen under Farnsworth, Lee's right was ready to receive
them. Proudly they rode, but promptly were they repulsed. Many
saddles were emptied by Confederate bullets. The intrepid
commander, General Farnsworth himself, lost his life in the
charge. On the other flank, and with similar design, Lee had
placed Stuart with his dashing Confederate riders. Stuart was to
attack when Lee's infantry had pierced Meade's centre, and
when the Union army was cut in twain and in rapid retreat. This
occasion never came to Stuart, but he found all the opportunity
be could reasonably desire for the exercise of his men

and horses in a furious combat with Gregg's five thousand
Union troopers.

The introduction of gunpowder and bullets and of long-range
repeating rifles has, in modern warfare, greatly lessened the
effectiveness of cavalry in general battle with infantry, and
deprived that great arm of the service of the terror which its
charges once inspired.
In wars of the early centuries, the swift horsemen rode down
the comparatively helpless infantry and trampled its ranks under
the horses' feet. For ages after the dismemberment of the
Roman Empire, it was the vast bodies of cavalry that checked
and changed the currents of battles and settled the fate of
armies and empires. This is not true now--can never be true
again; but a cavalry charge, met by a countercharge of cavalry,
is still, perhaps, the most terrible spectacle witnessed in war. If
the reader has never seen such a charge, he can form little
conception of its awe-inspiring fury. Imagine yourself looking
down from Gettysburg's heights upon the open, wide-spreading
plain below, where five thousand horses are marshalled in battle
line. Standing beside them are five thousand riders, armed,
booted and spurred, and ready to mount. The bugles sound the
"Mount!" and instantly five thousand plumes rise above the
horses as the riders spring into their saddles. In front of the
respective squadrons the daring leaders take their places. The
fluttering pennants or streaming guidons, ten to each regiment,
mark the left of the companies. On the opposite slope of the
same plain are five thousand hostile horsemen clad in different
uniforms, ready to meet these in countercharge. Under those ten
thousand horses are their hoofs, iron-shod and pitiless, beneath
whose furious tread the plain is soon to quiver. Again on each
slope of the open field the bugles sound. Ten thousand sabres
leap from scabbards and glisten in the

sun. The trained horses chafe their restraining bits, and, as the
bugle notes sound the charge, their nostrils dilate and their flanks
swell in sympathetic impulse with the dashing riders. "Forward!"
shouts the commander. Down the lines and through the
columns in quick succession ring the echoing commands,
"Forward, forward!" As this order thrills through eager ears,
sabres flash and spurs are planted in palpitating flanks. The
madly flying horses thunder across the trembling field, filling the
air with clouds of dust and whizzing pebbles. Their iron-rimmed
hoofs in remorseless tread crush the stones to powder and crash
through the flesh and bones of hapless riders who chance to fall.
As front against front these furious riders plunge, their sweeping
sabres slashing edge against edge, cutting a way through
opposing ranks, gashing faces, breaking arms, and splitting
heads, it is a scene of wildest war, a whirling tempest of battle,
short-lived but terrible.

Ewell's Corps, of which my command was a part, was the
last to leave Gettysburg, and the only corps of either army, I
believe, that forded the Potomac. Reaching this river, we found it
for the time an impassable barrier against our further progress
southward. The pontoons had been destroyed. The river was
deep and muddy, swollen and swift. We were leaving
Pennsylvania and the full granaries that had fed us. Pennsylvania
was our Egypt whither we had "gone to buy corn." We regretted
leaving, although we had found far less favor with the authorities
of this modern Egypt than had Joseph and his brethren with the
rulers of the ancient land of abundance.

The fording of the Potomac in the dim starlight of that 13th of
July night, and early morning of the 14th, was a spectacular
phase of war so quaint and impressive as to leave itself lastingly
daguerreotyped on the

memory. To the giants in the army the passage was
comparatively easy, but the short-legged soldiers were a source
of anxiety to the officers and of constant amusement to their
long-legged comrades. With their knapsacks high up on their
shoulders, their cartridge-boxes above the knapsacks, and their
guns lifted still higher to keep them dry, these little heroes of the
army battled with the current from shore to shore. Borne down
below the line of march by the swiftly rolling water, slipping and
sliding in the mud and slime, and stumbling over the boulders at
the bottom, the marvel is that none were drowned. The
irrepressible spirit for fun-making, for jests and good-natured
gibes, was not wanting to add to the grotesque character of the
passage. Let the reader imagine himself, if he can, struggling to
hold his feet under him, with the water up to his armpits, and
some tall, stalwart man just behind him shouting, "Pull ahead,
Johnny; General Meade will help you along directly by turning
loose a battery of Parrott guns on you." Or another, in his front,
calling to him: "Run here, little boy, and get on my back, and I
'll carry you over safely." Or still another, with mock solemnity,
proposing to change the name of the corps to "Lee's Waders,"
and this answered by a counter-proposition to petition the
Secretary of War to imitate old Frederick the Great and
organize a corps of "Six-footers" to do this sort of work for the
whole army. Or still another offering congratulations on this
opportunity for being washed, "The first we have had, boys, for
weeks, and General Lee knows we need it."

Most of our wounded and our blue-coated comrades who
accompanied us as prisoners were shown greater
consideration--they were ferried across in boats. The only serious casualty
connected with this dangerous crossing occurred at the point
least expected. From the pontoon-bridge, which had been
repaired, and which

was regarded as not only the most comfortable but by far the
safest method of transit, the horses and a wagon loaded with
sick and wounded were plunged into the river. By well-directed
effort they were rescued, not one of the men, I believe, being
lost.

General Meade was deliberate in his pursuit, if not considerate
in his treatment of us. He had induced us to change our minds.
Instead of visiting Philadelphia, on this trip, he had persuaded us to
return toward Richmond. He doubtless thought that the last day's
fight at Gettysburg was fairly good work for one campaign, and
that if he attempted to drive us more rapidly from Pennsylvania,
the experiment might prove expensive. As previously intimated,
he was probably correct in this opinion. Had he left his strong
position while Lee stood waiting for him to come out on the
Fourth of July at Gettysburg and to assume the offensive, the
chances are at least even that his assault would have been
repelled and might have led to a Union disaster. One of the wisest
adages in war is to avoid doing what your antagonist desires, and
it is beyond dispute that, from General Lee down through all the
grades, even to the heroic privates in the ranks, there was a
readiness if not a desire to meet General Meade should he
advance upon us. Meade's policy after the Confederate repulse at
Gettysburg did not differ materially from that of Lee after the
Union repulse at Fredericksburg. General Halleck, as he surveyed
the situation from Washington, did not like General Meade's
deliberation and pelted him with telegrams extremely nettling to
that proud soldier's sensibilities. In the citadel of the War Office
at Washington, General Halleck could scarcely catch so clear a
view of the situation as could General Meade from the bloody and
shivered rocks of the Round Tops. No one doubts General
Halleck's ability or verbal impetuosity. To Southern apprehension,
however, there was far more serious work

to be expected from the silent Grant and the undemonstrative
Meade than from the explosive Halleck or fulminating Pope.

It is one of the curious coincidences of the war that the
results at Gettysburg furnished the occasion for the tender of
resignation by each of the commanders-in-chief. Lee offered to
resign because he had not satisfied himself ; Meade because he
had not satisfied his Government. Lee feared discontent among
his people; Meade found it with General Halleck. Relief from
command was denied to Lee; it was granted at last to Meade.

It would have been a fatal mistake, a blunder, to have
accepted General Lee's resignation. There was no other man
who could have filled his place in the confidence, veneration, and
love of his army. His relief from command in Virginia would
have brought greater dissatisfaction, if not greater disaster, than
did the removal from command of General Joseph E. Johnston in
Georgia. The Continental Congress might as safely have
dispensed with the services of Washington as could the
Confederacy with those of Lee. Looking back now over the
records of that Titanic sectional struggle in the light of Lee's
repeated successes prior to the Gettysburg battle and of his
prolonged resistance in 1864-65, with depleted ranks and
exhausted resources, how strangely sounds the story of his
self-abnegation and desire to turn over his army to some "younger
and abler man"! How beautiful and deeply sincere the words,
coming from his saddened heart, in which he characterized his
devoted followers in that official letter tendering his resignation!
Speaking of the new commander, whose selection he was
anxious should at once be made, he said: "I know he will have
as gallant and brave an army as ever existed to second his
efforts, and it will be the happiest day of my life to see at its
head a worthy leader--one who can accomplish

more than I can hope to perform, and all that I have wished." He
urged with characteristic earnestness as his reason for asking the
selection of another commander, "the desire to serve my
country, and to do all in my power to insure the success of her
righteous cause." He had no grievances to ventilate; no
scapegoat to bear the burden of his responsibilities; no puerile
repinings at the fickleness of Fortune; no complaints to lodge
against the authorities above him for the paucity of the resources
they were able to provide. Of himself, and of himself only, did he
complain; and he was the only man in his army who would have
made such complaint. General Lee might criticise himself, but
criticisms of him by any other officer would have been answered
by an indignant and crushing rebuke from the whole Confederate
army. The nearest approach he made to fault-finding was his
statement that his own sight was not perfect, and that he was so
dull that, in attempting to use the eyes of others, he found himself
often misled.

To General Lee's request to be relieved, and to have an abler
man placed in his position, Mr. Davis very pointedly and
truthfully replied that to request him to find some one "more fit
for command, or who possessed more of the confidence of the
army, or of the reflecting men of the country, is to demand an
impossibility."

CHAPTER XII

VICKSBURG AND HELENA

The four most crowded and decisive days of the war--Vicksburg the
culmination of Confederate disaster--Frequent change of commanders in the
Trans-Mississippi Department--General Grant's tunnel at Fort Hill--Courage
of Pemberton's soldiers--Explosion of the mine--Hand-to-hand conflict--
The surrender.

IF called upon to select in the four years of war, from April, 1861,
to April, 1865, four consecutive days into which were crowded
events more momentous and decisive than occurred in any
other like period, I should name the 1st, 2d, 3d, and 4th of July,
1863. During the first three we were engaged at Gettysburg in
a struggle which might decide the fate of the Federal capital, of
Baltimore, and possibly of Philadelphia, if not of the Union
itself. On the 4th General Grant received the surrender at
Vicksburg of 35,000 Confederates under General Pemberton.

There were other days which will always be conspicuous in
the records of that war; but I do not believe that any other four
days, consecutive or isolated, so directly and decidedly dashed
the hopes of the Southern people. The double disaster to our
arms--the Gettysburg failure and the fall of Vicksburg--occurring
at distant points and almost simultaneously, was a blow heavy
enough to have effectually dispirited any army that was ever
marshalled. It is, however, a remarkable fact that the morale of
the Confederate army was not affected--at

least, was not perceptibly lowered by it. The men endured
increasing privations with the same cheerfulness and fought with
the same constancy and courage after those events as they did
before. In proof, I need only summon as witnesses the fields of
Chickamauga, Resaca, Atlanta, and Jonesboro in Georgia;
Franklin in Tennessee; Monocacy in Maryland; and the
Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Harbor, Bermuda Hundred, and
Petersburg in Virginia. To Southern thought this wonderfully
persistent courage of the Southern troops is easily understood on
the theory that the independence of the South was as
consecrated a cause as any for which freemen ever fought; but
it is probably true that such steadfastness and constancy under
such appalling conditions will remain to analytical writers of later
times one of the unsolved mysteries of that marvellous era of
internecine strife.

The capture by General Grant of Pemberton and his men at
Vicksburg was preceded by no great victories in the West for
either side. The Confederates, however, had been successful in
their efforts to hold some points on the Mississippi River, thus
preventing its entire control by the Union army and the complete
isolation of the Confederate forces in the Trans-Mississippi
Department. On the very day (Fourth of July, 1863) when
General Grant was receiving the surrender of Vicksburg and its
starving army, the Confederates on the other side of the
Mississippi were fighting for the possession of the river at
Helena, Arkansas. General Sterling Price ("Old Pap," as he was
affectionately called by his men, who felt for him the devotion of
children for a father) had captured one of the leading forts which
crowned the hill at Helena, and was halting in the fort for
Generals Joe Shelby and Walker, under Marmaduke, to capture
the most northern fort and then sweep down upon the Union
lines held by Colonel Clayton. Shelby was wounded, and Walker
did

not assail the Union lines because he was waiting under
orders until the fort was captured by Shelby. Out of this affair
grew that unfortunate quarrel between Generals Walker and
Marmaduke which ended in a challenge
to a duel, and the killing of Walker by Marmaduke.

While Price was thus waiting for the movement under
Marmaduke, General Holmes, who was the commander-in-chief
of the Confederate forces, rode to the captured fort. He ordered
General Price at once to assault an infinitely stronger fort, one
heavily manned and practically impregnable. The forces which Price
could bring against it were utterly inadequate, and the assault failed, disastrously
failed, adding to the discomfiture of the Confederacy.

As illustrating the trials which beset both the Confederate and
United States governments in their efforts to
select able and efficient chiefs for their armies, I may note the
fact that the Trans-Mississippi Department changed
commanders about as often as the Union army in Virginia
changed leaders in its repeated marches upon Richmond.
General Holmes was not successful in his effort to command the
support or the good-will of his officers and men. Disagreements
with his officers were not rare, and arrests were not infrequent.
On a notable occasion General Joe Shelby, of Missouri, one of
the noted cavalry officers of the Civil War, was placed under
arrest and ordered to report to the Commanding General.
Shelby, in his cavalry operations, was compelled to depend
largely upon his own efforts among the people to furnish
supplies for his men and horses. Necessarily, under such
circumstances, there were occasional collisions between his
appointed foragers and the suffering citizens. Such
disagreements could not be avoided, although the
citizens were patriotic and generous, and the large body of
Shelby's men were of the law-abiding and leading classes of
northern Missouri. When these disagreements

occurred between the soldiers and the citizens, complaints
were made to General Holmes. Without waiting to investigate
the charges, he at once ordered Shelby under arrest. When the
dashing cavalryman appeared before his commanding general to
learn the reason for his arrest, the irascible General Holmes
opened upon him a battery of invective. His first discharge was:
"General Shelby, you are charged with being a robber, sir, and
your men with being thieves."

"Who made these charges, General Holmes?"

"Everybody, sir; everybody!"

"And you believe them, do you, General Holmes?"

"Certainly I do, sir. How can I help believing them?"

Joe Shelby, justly proud of his splendid command, was deeply
indignant at the wrong done both to himself and his high-spirited
men. He was also not a little amused by this remarkable
procedure and by the fiery invectives of the aged commander.
He quietly replied:

"Well, General Holmes, I will be more just to you than you
have been to me and my men. Everybody says that you are a
damned old fool; but I do not believe it."

This ended the interview, and in the ensuing battles nothing
more was heard of the arrest or the charges. General Shelby
died recently while holding the office of United States Marshal
for his State and the position of Commander of the United
Confederate Veterans of Missouri.

Among these Missouri Confederates was Dick Lloyd, a
private in Price's command who deserves a place among
American heroes. In a furious battle Dick Lloyd had both arms
shot off below the elbow. He recovered, however, and refused
to be retired from service. Without hands he still did his duty as
a soldier to the end of the war, acting as courier, and guiding
and successfully managing his horse by tying the bridle-reins
around the crook in his elbow. He lives now in

Helena, and has supported his family for years by riding
horseback, carrying mail through country districts.

The commander of the Union forces at Helena on this fourth
day of July, 1863, was the gallant General Prentiss, who made so
enviable a record at Shiloh, where he was captured. In that battle
the position which for hours was held by his men was raked by so
deadly a fire that it was called by the Federals "The Hornet's
Nest" and he "The Hero of the Hornet's Nest." At Helena, July,
1863, he repulsed Shelby at the flanking fort, Feagin at Fort
Hindman, and Price at Fort Curtis, after that brave old Missourian
had captured the fortress upon Graveyard Hill. Prentiss was,
therefore, enabled to join General Grant in celebrating the Fourth
of July over another victory for the Union armies. The roaring
guns on the opposite banks of the Mississippi proclaimed the
opening of the river from the source to its mouth--news as
depressing to the Confederates as it was inspiring to the Union
armies. To the Southern heart and hope this final capture and
complete control of the great waterway severing the Confederate
territory and isolating the great storehouse beyond the Mississippi,
while recognized as a great calamity, was perhaps less
depressing and galling than the surrender at Vicksburg of
Pemberton's splendid army of 35,000 men. The imperial Roman,
Caesar Augustus, after the crushing defeat of his vicegerent
Varus in Germany, which involved the destruction of his army
and the dragging of his proud Eagles in the dust, lamented more
the loss of that valiant body of Roman soldiery than he did the
breaking of his dominion over German territory. In his grief over
this irreparable disaster, Augustus is said to have murmured to
himself as he gazed into vacancy, "Varus, Varus, give me back
my legions." It is no exaggeration to say that if General
Pemberton could have saved his army, could have

given back to the Confederacy those splendid "legions" which
had so long and so bravely fought and starved in the trenches
around Vicksburg, the fall of that Mississippi city would have
been stripped of more than half its depressing effects. General
Grant knew this. He knew that the Confederate government
could not replace those soldiers, who were among its best; and
he decided, therefore, to circumvent, if possible, all efforts at
escape and every movement to rescue them.

General Johnston, then chief in command of the Army of the
West, had anticipated the siege of Vicksburg and had
persistently endeavored to prevent General Pemberton being
hemmed in. But there was no other avenue open to General
Pemberton, as General Grant had closed all other lines of
retreat.

The shock of Vicksburg's fall was felt from one end of
the Confederacy to the other. Following so closely on the
repulse of the Confederates at Gettysburg, it called from the
press and people thoughtless and unfair criticisms. In a
peculiarly sensitive mood, the public sought some other
explanation than the real one, and great injustice was done
General Pemberton. But this brave officer's loyalty and devotion
were tested--thoroughly tested. At a sacrifice almost
measureless, he had separated from his own kindred, and in
obedience to his profound convictions had drawn his sword for
Southern independence. He did not cut his way out of
Vicksburg because his army was not strong enough; he did not
hold the city longer because his troops and the population could
not live without food. That great soldier, General Joseph E.
Johnston, with all his skill in manoeuvre and as strategist, failed
to afford the needed relief. At Raymond, on May 12, General
Johnston had been forced back upon Jackson, Mississippi. On
the 14th he fought the heavy battle of Jackson. On the 16th,

Pemberton moved out and fought, grandly fought, at Champion
Hill. Three days later he made another stand against Grant's
advance at Black River; holding the weaker lines and with
inferior forces, he was driven into the trenches at Vicksburg.
On the 22d of May, three days later, General Grant invested the
fated city. Thenceforward to July 4th Pemberton and his men
held those works against the combined fire of small arms,
artillery, and gunboats, sinking a Union monitor on the river,
making sorties to the front, resisting efforts to scale the works,
rallying around the breach made by the explosion at Fort Hill,
rushing upon and crushing the Union columns as they pressed
into that breach, and holding the city against every assault, save
that of starvation.

Scarcely had General Grant settled in his lines around the city
when his intrepid men were standing in the dim starlight on the
margin of the ditches which bordered the Confederate
earthworks. With scaling-ladders on their shoulders, they made
ready to mount the parapets and fight hand to hand with the
devoted Confederate defenders. These great ditches were deep
and wide; the scaling-ladders were too short. Upon the top of
the earthworks stood Pemberton's men, pouring a galling fire
down on the Union heads below. Under that fire the Union
ranks melted, some falling dead upon the bank, others tumbling
headlong into the ditches, still others leaping voluntarily sixteen
feet downward to its bottom to escape the consuming blast, and
the remainder abandoning the futile effort in precipitate retreat.

The commanding position along the line of defensive works
was the fortress on the lofty eminence called Fort Hill. Toward
this fortress, with the purpose of undermining it and blowing it
skyward, General Grant began early in June to drive his
zigzag tunnel. The

task was not herculean in the amount of labor required to
accomplish it, but was a most tedious one, as but few men could
be employed at the work, and every pound of earth had to be
carried out at the tunnel's mouth. Day and night the work was
pressed. Nearer and nearer the tunnel approached the point
where mother earth was to receive into her innocent bosom the
explosives that would hurl the fort high into the air and bury in
the ruins the brave men who defended it. While such explosions
failed to accomplish important results during this war, the
knowledge that they were to occur, and the uncertainty as to
when or where, filled the minds of soldiers with an indescribable
apprehension. The high-spirited volunteers of both armies could
meet without a tremor the most furious storms and agony of
battle in the open field, where they could see the foe and meet
fire with fire; if need be, they could face the pelting hail of
bullets without returning a shot, and meet death as Napoleon's
great marshal proposed to meet it when, in the endeavor to hold
his troops in a withering fire without returning it, he stepped to
their front and, folding his arms, said to them, "Soldiers of
France, see, how a marshal can die in discharge of his duty!"
But to walk the silent parapets in the gloom of night, above the
magazine of death which they know was beneath them, to stand
in line along the threatened battlements, with only the dull tread
of the sentinel sounding in the darkness, while the imagination
pictured the terrors of the explosion which was coming perhaps
that night, perhaps that hour or that moment, or the next: this
was a phase of war which taxed the nerve of any soldier, even
the most phlegmatic.

Pemberton's soldiers, faint with hunger and in full knowledge
that they were standing above a death-dealing magazine, endured
such harrowing suspense night after night for weeks. As each
regiment was

successively assigned to the awful duty, they wondered whether
the tunnel was yet complete, whether the barrels of powder had
been placed beneath them, whether it was to be their fate or the
fate of the next regiment to be whirled upward with tons of
earth and torn limb from limb. Bravely, grandly, they took their
posts without a murmur. No hyperbole can exaggerate the
loftiness of spirit that could calmly await the moment and
manner of such a martyrdom. Every one of those emaciated
Southern soldiers who trod that fated ground should have his
name recorded in history. Beside them in American war annals
should be placed the names of those Union soldiers who, amidst
the explosions and conflagration at Yorktown, Virginia, in
December, 1863, won the gratitude of their people. During those
trying scenes, in the effort to prevent the escape of the
Confederate prisoners, Private Michael Ryan of the Sixteenth
New York, his leg shivered by a shell, remained on his knees at
his post with his musket in hand. Private Healey, One Hundred
and Forty-eighth New York, stood at the gate, almost parched by
the flames, until the explosion hurled the gate and his own body
high into the air.

On the night of June 26, 1863, the long-dreaded hour came to
Pemberton's faithful and fated watchers. General Grant had
finished his tunnel. Under the fortress at Fort Hill he had piled
the tons of powder, and had run through this powder electric
wires whose sparks of fire were to wake the black Hercules to
the work of death. As Pemberton's Confederates stood around
the silent battlements, the moments were lengthened into hours
by the intensity of their apprehension; and as Grant's veterans
crept and formed in the darkness behind the adjacent hills,
waiting for the earthquake shock to summon them to the breach,
the clock in the sleeping city struck the hour of ten. The electric
messengers,

flew along the wires. The loaded magazines responded with the
convulsive roar of a thousand unchained thunderbolts. The hills
quivered, shaking from roof to foundation-stone every Vicksburg
home. High above its highest turret flew the trampled floor of
the fortress, with the bodies of its gray-clad defenders. Into its
powder-blackened and smoking ruins quickly rushed the charging
columns of Grant, led by the Thirty-second Regiment of Illinois;
Pemberton's Confederates from the right and left and rear of the
demolished fort piled into the breach at the same instant. Hand
to hand over the upheaved and rugged earth they grappled with
the invaders in the darkness. This Illinois regiment, after
desperately fighting and holding the breach for two hours, was
overpowered. Again and again in rapid succession came the
Union charges. Pemberton's veterans, from the broken rim of the
fortress, poured upon them an incessant fire from small arms,
and, carrying loaded shells with burning fuses in their hands,
rolled them down the crater's banks to explode among the
densely packed attacking forces. For six hours this furious
combat raged in the darkness. From ten at night till four in the
morning the resolute Federals held the breach, but could make
no headway against the determined Confederate resistance. The
tunnel had been driven, the magazine exploded, and the fort
demolished. The long agony of Confederate suspense was over.
The desperate effort of the Union commander to force his
column through the breach had failed. The heaps of his dead and
wounded, more than a thousand in number, piled in that narrow
space, had given to this spot among his surviving men the name
of "Logan's Slaughter Pen." In the terrific explosion a
Confederate negro, who chanced to be in the fort at the time,
was thrown a considerable distance toward the Union line
without being fatally hurt. Picking himself up half dead, half

CHAPTER XIII

FROM VICKSBURG AND GETTYSBURG TO CHICKAMAUGA

Lee's army again headed toward Washington--He decides not to cross the
Potomac at the opening of winter--Meade's counter-attack--Capture of a
redoubt on the Rappahannock--A criticism of Secretary Stanton--General
Bragg's strategy--How Rosecrans compelled the evacuation of Chattanooga.

IN the autumn of 1863 both Lee's and Meade's armies had
returned from Pennsylvania and were again camping or
tramping on the soil of Virginia. The Union forces were in
complete and easy communication with the great storehouses
and granaries of the North and West. The Confederates were
already in a struggle for meagre subsistence. Meade began
another march on Richmond. Lee patched up his army as best
he could, threw it across Meade's path, and halted him at the
Rapidan. Thenceforward for weeks and months, these two
commanders were watching each other from opposite sides of
the Rapidan, moving up and down the river and the roads,
seeking an opportunity for a blow and never finding it. Lee
made the first move. On October 9,1863, he headed his army
again toward Washington and the Potomac, passing Meade's
right, and threatening to throw the Confederates between the
Union forces and the national capital. Lee at one time was
nearer to Washington than Meade, but as there was no longer
any green corn in the fields for the Southern soldiers to subsist
upon, the difficulty of feeding them checked Lee's march

and put Meade ahead of him and nearer to the defences around
Washington. Lee then debated whether he should assail Meade
on or near the old field of Bull Run or recross the Potomac into
Maryland and Pennsylvania. He decided not to attack, because
he found Meade's position too strong and too well intrenched.
He declined to cross again the Potomac at the opening of winter,
because, as he said, "Thousands of our men are barefooted,
thousands with fragments of shoes, all without overcoats,
blankets, or warm clothing. I cannot bear to expose them to
certain suffering on an uncertain issue." We were not able then,
as formerly, to furnish to each soldier strips of rawhide, which
he might tie on, with the hair side next his feet, and thus make
rude sandals; and these picturesque foot-coverings, if obtainable,
would scarcely have been sufficient for long marches in the
coming freezes. So Lee returned to his camps behind the
Rapidan and Rappahannock.

Some spirited engagements of minor importance occurred
between detached portions of the two armies, in which the
honors were about equally divided between the two sides.
Stuart's Southern horsemen had the better of the fight at
Buckland, and the Confederates were successful on the
Rapidan; but Warren's Union forces captured five pieces of
artillery and between four and five hundred prisoners from A. P.
Hill.

As Lee moved back, Meade followed, and the programme of
marching after each other across the river was resumed. Just
one month, lacking two days, after Lee's move toward
Washington, Meade turned his columns toward Richmond. His
first dash, made at a redoubt which stood in his way on the north
bank of the Rappahannock, was a brilliant success. The redoubt
was occupied by a portion of Early's troops, and was carried just
before nightfall by a sudden rush. I sat on my horse, with a
number of officers, on the opposite side of the little

river, almost within a stone's throw of the spot. General Early did
not seem to consider it seriously threatened, nor did any one
else, although the Union artillery was throwing some shells, one
of which lowered the perch of a visiting civilian at my side by
shortening the legs of his horse. The dash upon the redoubt was
made by Maine and Wisconsin regiments--troops of Russell and
Upton, under Sedgwick, who was regarded by the Confederates
as one of the best officers in the Union army. Personally I had
great reason to respect Sedgwick, for it was my fortune in the
ensuing campaign to be pitted against him on several occasions.
Though nothing like so serious to the Confederates in its results,
this brilliant little episode on the Rappahannock resembled in
character the subsequent great charge of Hancock over the
Bloody Angle at Spottsylvania on May 12, 1864. Both assaults
were so unexpected and made with such a rush that the
defending troops had no time to fire. Only a few shots were
discharged at Hancock's men at Spottsylvania, and in the capture
of this redoubt by Russell and Upton only six Union men were
killed. It was justly considered by General Meade as most
creditable to his troops; and he sent General Russell himself to
bear the eight captured Confederate flags to Washington. Mr.
Stanton may have been a great Secretary of War, and I must
suppose him such; but if he treated General Russell as he is
reported to have treated him, he had as little appreciation of the
keen sensibilities of a high-strung soldier as old Boreas has for the
green summer glories of the great oak. The Secretary, it is said,
was "too busy" to see General Russell. The proposition will
scarcely be questioned, I think, that a Secretary of War, who is
not called upon to endure the hardships of the field and meet the
dangers of battle, should never be "too busy" to meet a gallant
soldier who is defending his Rag at the front, and who calls to lay
before him the

trophies of victory. Perhaps the Secretary thought that General
Russell and his men had only done their duty. So they had; but
"Light Horse Harry" Lee, the father of General Robert E. Lee,
only did his duty when he planned and executed the brilliant dash
upon Paulus Hook and captured it. The Continental Congress,
however, thought it worth its while to turn from its regular
business and make recognition of the handsome work done by
voting the young officer a gold medal. All the wreaths ever
conferred at the Olympic games, all the decorations of honor
ever bestowed upon the brave, all the swords and the thanks
ever voted to a soldier, were designed to make the same impress
upon their recipients which three minutes of the busy Secretary's
time and a few gracious words would have produced on the
mind and spirit of General Russell and his comrades.

General Meade crossed the Rappahannock and then
recrossed it. He found Lee strongly posted behind Mine Run,
and suddenly returned to his winter quarters. General Lee
moved back to his encampment on the border of the Wilderness
and along the historic banks of the Rapidan.

Meantime, in the months intervening between the Gettysburg
campaign and the hibernation of the two armies in 1863-64, a
portion of Lee's forces had been sent under Longstreet to aid
Bragg in his effort to check the further advance of the Union
army under Rosecrans at Chickamauga. My troops were not
among those sent to Georgia, and therefore took no part in that
great battle which saturated with blood the soil of my native
State.

A chapter full of interest to the military critic and to the
student of strategy might be written of the two armies
commanded respectively by Rosecrans and Bragg, and of their
movements prior to the clash in the woodlands at
Chickamauga.

The antecedent campaign runs back in a connected chain to
the battle of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, in the preceding
December. Under General Bragg, at Murfreesboro, as one of
his division commanders, was an ex-Vice-President of the
United States, who had also been a prominent candidate for the
Presidency in the campaign of 1860, and had presided over the
joint session of the two houses of Congress when Abraham
Lincoln was declared duly elected. This illustrious statesman,
who was fast winning his way to distinction in his new rôle of
Confederate soldier, was John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky.
Tall, erect, and commanding in physique, he would have been
selected in any martial group as a typical leader. In the campaign
in the Valley of Virginia, where I afterward saw much of him, he
exhibited in a marked degree the characteristics of a great
commander. He was fertile in resource, and enlisted and held the
confidence and affection of his men, while he inspired them with
enthusiasm and ardor. Under fire and in extreme peril he was
strikingly courageous, alert, and self-poised. No man in the
Confederate army had surrendered a brighter political future,
sacrificed more completely his personal ambition, or suffered
more keenly from the perplexing conditions in his own State.
With all his other trials, and before he had fairly begun his career
as a soldier, General Breckinridge had been strongly tempted to
challenge to personal combat his superior officer, General Bragg,
who at the time was commander-in-chief of the Confederate
forces in the Department of Tennessee and the West. At the
battle of Murfreesboro, Tennessee (December, 1862), this
brilliant soldier from the blue-grass region had led his gallant
Kentuckians through a consuming fire on both flanks, losing
about thirty-six per cent. of his men in less than half an hour.
General Bragg, who, it seems, was not present at the point
where this movement

was made, had in some way been misinformed as to the
conduct of General Breckinridge's troops, and sent to Richmond
a disparaging despatch.

These high-bred sons of Kentucky who had left home and
kindred behind them had already made a record of devotion and
daring, which grew in lustre to the end of the war, and which any
troops of any army might envy. At this battle of Murfreesboro
they had waded the river in chilly December, had charged and
captured the first heights and doubled back one wing of their
stubbornly fighting antagonists. They had, however, been
repelled with terrific slaughter in the impossible effort to capture
the still more commanding hill. In this fearful assault they had
marched between converging lines of fire drawn up in the shape
of the letter V, the apex of those lines formed by hills crowned
with batteries. Among their killed was the dashing General
Hanson, one of the foremost soldiers of Bragg's army. No troops
that were ever marshalled could have succeeded under such
conditions and against such odds. Had they persisted in the
effort, they would simply have invited annihilation. Smarting
under a sense of the injustice done themselves and their dead
comrades by the commanding general's despatch to Richmond,
and realizing their own inability to have the wrong righted, they
appealed to General Breckinridge, their own commander, to
resent the insult. Resolutions and protests were powerless to
soothe their smarting sensibilities or to assuage their burning
wrath. They urged General Breckinridge to resign his position in
the army and call General Bragg to personal account--to
challenge him to single-handed combat. General Breckinridge
must have felt as keenly as they the wrong inflicted, but he was
more self-contained. He sought to appease them by reminding
them of the exalted motives which had impelled them to enlist in
the army as volunteers, of the

self-sacrifice which they had exhibited, and of their duty as
soldiers to endure any personal wrong for the sake of the
common cause. His appeal was not in vain; and when he added
that if both he and General Bragg should live to the end of the
war, he would not forget their request to call the commanding
general to account, they gladly went forward, enduring and
fighting to the end.

The Fabian policy of General Bragg, adopted after the bloody
encounter at Murfreesboro, his retreat to Chattanooga and
beyond it, called from press and people fewer and milder protests
than those afterward made against General Joseph E. Johnston
for a like policy. It would seem that the persistent criticisms of
General Johnston for not meeting General Sherman between
Dalton and Atlanta in determined battle, might have been applied
with equal force to General Bragg for surrendering the strong
positions in the gaps of the Cumberland Mountains and the line
of the Tennessee River to General Rosecrans, without
more resolute resistance. It is much easier, however, to
criticise a commander than to command an army. In both these
cases the strong positions alluded to could have been
successfully flanked and the Confederate commanders forced to
retire, as the Union troops moved around toward the rear and
threatened the Southern lines of communication and supplies.
General Rosecrans was too able a soldier and too wise a
strategist to assail General Bragg in his selected stronghold when
the country was open to him on either flank. His policy,
therefore, was to cross the Tennessee River, not in front of
Chattanooga, where Bragg was ready to meet him, but at a
distance either above or below it. Both were practicable; and he
set his army in motion toward points both above and below the
city, thus leaving General Bragg in doubt as to his real purpose.
He sent a force to the hills just opposite Chattanooga, and
opened heavy fire with his batteries upon Bragg's position. He
sent

still larger forces up the right bank of the Tennessee to a point
more than forty miles above Chattanooga. Campfires were built
along the brows of the mountains and on hillsides, in order to
attract Bragg's attention and create the belief that the great body
of the Union army was above the city. Troops were marched
across open spaces exposed to view, then countermarched behind
the hills, and passed again and again through the same open
spaces, thus deepening the impression that large forces were
marching up the river. To still further strengthen this impression
upon the Confederate commander, Union drums were beat and
bugles sounded for great distances along the mountain-ranges.
Union axes, saws, and hammers were loud in their
demonstrations of boat-building; but they were only
demonstrations. The real work, the real preparation, was going
forward fully fifty miles south of this noisy point. The apparent
movement above Chattanooga, and the real preparation for
crossing far below, were admirably planned and consummately
executed by General Rosecrans, and showed a strategic ability
perhaps not surpassed by any officer during the war. Behind the
woods and hills men were drilled in the work of laying bridges.
Trains of cars loaded with bridges and boats were unloaded at a
point entirely protected from the view of the Confederate cavalry
on the opposite banks of the river. Fifty of these boats, each with
a capacity of fifty men, were hurried in the early morning to the
river-bank and launched upon the water. This formidable fleet,
carrying 2500 armed men, pulled for the other shore, which was
guarded only by Confederate cavalry pickets. With this strong
force of Union infantry landed on the southern bank, the
pontoon-bridge soon spanned the stream. Across it were hurried all the
Union infantry and artillery that could be crowded upon it. At
other points canoes of enormous size were hewn out of tall
poplars that grew in the lowlands. Logs were

rolled into the stream and fastened together, and as these
improvised flotillas, loaded with soldiers, were pushed from the
shore, athletic swimmers, left behind, caught the enthusiasm, and
piling their clothing, arms, and accoutrements upon rails lashed
together, leaped into the stream and swam across, pushing the
loaded rails before them. At still another point the Union cavalry
rode into the river and spurred their hesitating horses into the
deep water for a long swim to the other shore. As thousands of
struggling, snorting horses bore these human forms sitting upright
upon their backs, nothing seen above the water's surface except
the erect upper portions of the riders' bodies and the puffing
nostrils of the horses with their bushy tails spread out behind
them, the scene must have presented the appearance of a mass
of moving centaurs rather than an army of mounted soldiers.
Such scenes, however, were not infrequent during the war--
especially with the noted Confederate raiders of John Morgan,
Jeb Stuart, Bedford Forrest, and Mosby. With his army safely
across the river, General Rosecrans pushed heavy columns
across Raccoon and Lookout mountains and the intervening
valley, completely turned General Bragg's position, and
compelled the evacuation of Chattanooga without a skirmish.

It would be the grossest injustice to General Bragg to hold him
responsible for the failure to prevent General Rosecrans
crossing the Tennessee. An army double the size of the one he
commanded would have been wholly insufficient to cover the
stretch of more than one hundred miles of river-frontage. The
Union commander could have laid his pontoons and forced a
passage at almost any point against so attenuated a line of
resistance. General Bragg was not only one of the boldest
fighters in the Confederate army, but he was an able
commander. Retreat from Chattanooga was his only resource.
This movement was made not

an hour too soon. Rosecrans's columns were sweeping down
from the eastern Lookout Bluffs, and would speedily have
grasped Bragg's only line of railroad and held his only avenues of
escape. As the Union officers Thomas and McCook came down
the eastern slopes of the mountain and Crittenden came around
its point and into Chattanooga, Bragg placed his army in position
for either resisting, retreating, or advancing. He decided to
assume the offensive and to attack the Union forces in their
isolated positions, and crush them, if possible, in detail. Longstreet
had not yet arrived; but had Bragg's plan of assault been
vigorously executed, it now seems certain that he would have
won a great triumph before the Union army could have been
concentrated along the western bank of the Chickamauga.
General Rosecrans himself and his corps commanders were fully
alive to the hazardous position of his army. Bragg's aggressive
front changed the policy of the Union commander from one of
segregation for pursuit to one of concentration for defence.
Rapidly and skilfully was that concentration effected. Boldly and
promptly did the Confederates advance. The next scene on
which the curtain rose was the collision, the crash, the
slaughter at Chickamauga.

CHAPTER XIV

CHICKAMAUGA

One of the bloodiest battles of modern times--Comparison with other
great battles of the world--Movements of both armies before the
collision--A bird's-eye view--The night after the battle--General
Thomas's brave stand--How the assault of Longstreet's wing was made--
Both sides claim a victory.

REARED from childhood to maturity in North Georgia, I have
been for fifty years familiar with that historic locality traversed
by the little river Chickamauga, which has given its name to one
of the bloodiest battles of modern times. Not many years after
the Cherokee Indians had been transferred to their new Western
home from what was known as Cherokee Georgia, my father
removed to that portion of the State. Here were still the fresh
relics of the redskin warriors, who had fished in Chickamauga's
waters and shot the deer as they browsed in herds along its
banks. Every locality now made memorable by that stupendous
struggle between the Confederate and Union armies was
impressed upon my boyish memory by the legends which
associated them with deeds of Indian braves. One of the most
prominent features of the field was the old Ross House, built of
hewn logs, and formerly the home of Ross, a noted and fairly
well-educated Cherokee chief. In this old building I had often
slept at night on my youthful journeyings with my father through
that sparsely settled region. Snodgrass Hill,

Gordon's and Lee's Mills, around which the battle raged, the La
Fayette road, across which the contending lines so often
swayed, and the crystal Crawfish Spring, at which were
gathered thousands of the wounded, have all been so long
familiar to me that I am encouraged to attempt a brief
description of the awful and inspiring events of those bloody
September days in 1863. Words, however, cannot convey an
adequate picture of such scenes; of the countless costly, daring
assaults; of the disciplined or undisciplined but always dauntless
courage; of the grim, deadly grapple in hand-to-hand collisions;
of the almost unparalleled slaughter and agony.

An American battle which surpassed in its ratio of
carnage the bloodiest conflicts in history outside of this
country ought to be better understood by the American
people. Sharpsburg, or Antietam, I believe, had a
larger proportion of killed and wounded than any other
single day's battle of our war; and that means larger
than any in the world's wars. Chickamauga, however,
in its two days of heavy fighting, brought the ratio of
losses to the high-water mark. Judged by percentage
in killed and wounded, Chickamauga nearly doubled
the sanguinary records of Marengo and Austerlitz;
was two and a half times heavier than that sustained
by the Duke of Marlborough at Malplaquet; more than
double that suffered by the army under Henry of
Navarre in the terrific slaughter at Coutras; nearly
three times as heavy as the percentage of loss at
Solferino and Magenta; five times greater than that of
Napoleon at Wagram, and about ten times as heavy as
that of Marshal Saxe at Bloody Raucoux. Or if we
take the average percentage of loss in a number of the
world's great battles--Waterloo, Wagram, Valmy,
Magenta, Solferino, Zurich, and Lodi--we shall find by
comparison that Chickamauga's record of blood
surpassed them nearly three for one. It will not do to say

that this horrible slaughter in our Civil War was due to the longer
range of our rifles nor to the more destructive character of any
of our implements of warfare; for at Chickamauga as well as in
the Wilderness and at Shiloh, where these Americans fell at so
fearful a rate, the woodlands prevented the hostile lines from
seeing each other at great distances and rendered the improved
arms no more effective than would have been rifles of short
range. Some other and more reasonable explanation must be
found for this great disparity of losses in American and European
wars. There is but one possible explanation--the personal
character and the consecrated courage of American soldiers. At
Chickamauga thousands fell on both sides fighting at close
quarters, their faces at times burnt by the blazing powder at the
very muzzles of the guns.

The Federal army under Rosecrans constituted the center of
the Union battle line, which, in broadest military sense, stretched
from Washington City to New Orleans. The fall of Vicksburg
had at last established Federal control of the Mississippi along its
entire length. The purpose of Rosecrans's movement was to
penetrate the South's centre by driving the Confederates through
Georgia to the sea. Bragg, to whom was intrusted for the time
the task of resisting this movement, had retired before the Union
advance from Chattanooga to a point some miles south of the
Chickamauga, and the Union forces were pressing closely upon
his rear. Bragg had, however, halted and turned upon Rosecrans
and compelled him to retrace his steps to the north bank of the
Chickamauga, which, like the Chickahominy in Virginia, was to
become forever memorable in the Republic's annals.

In order to obtain a clear and comprehensive view of the
ever-shifting scenes during the prolonged battle, to secure a mental
survey of the whole field as the

marshalled forces swayed to and fro, charging and
countercharging, assaulting, breaking, retreating, reforming, and
again rushing forward in still more desperate assault, let the
reader imagine himself on some great elevation from which he
could look down upon that wooded, undulating, and rugged
region.

For forty-eight hours or more the marching columns of Bragg
were moving toward Chattanooga and along the south bank of
the Chickamauga in order to cross the river and strike the Union
forces on the left flank. At the same time Rosecrans summoned
his corps from different directions and concentrated them north
of the river. Having passed, as was supposed, far below the point
where the Union left rested, Bragg's columns, in the early hours
of the 19th of September, crossed the fords and bridges, and
prepared to sweep by left wheel on the Union flank. During the
night, however, George H. Thomas had moved his Union corps
from the right to this left flank. Neither army knew of the
presence of the other in this portion of the woodland. As Bragg
prepared to assail the Union left, Thomas, feeling his way
through the woods to ascertain what was in his front,
unexpectedly struck the Southern right, held by Forrest's cavalry,
and thus inaugurated the battle. Forrest was forced back; but he
quickly dismounted his men, sent the horses to the rear, and on
foot stubbornly resisted the advance of the Union infantry.
Quickly the Confederates moved to Forrest's support. The roar
of small arms on this extreme flank in the early morning
admonished both commanders to hurry thither their forces. Bragg
was forced to check his proposed assault upon another portion of
the Union lines and move to the defence of the Confederate
right. Rapidly the forces of the two sides were thrown into this
unexpected collision, and rapidly swelled the surging current of
battle. The divisions of the Union army before whom Forrest's
cavalry

had yielded were now driven back; but other Federals suddenly
rushed upon Forrest's front. The Southern troops, under
Cheatham and Stewart, Polk, Buckner, and Cleburne, hurried
forward in a united assault upon Thomas. Walthall's
Mississippians at this moment were hurled upon King's flank, and
drove his brigade in confusion through the Union lines; and as
Govan's gray-clad veterans simultaneously assailed the Union
forces under Scribner, that command also yielded. The Federal
battery was captured, and the tide of success seemed at the
moment to be with the Confederates. Fortune, however, always
fickle, was especially capricious in this battle. The Union forces
farther to westward held their ground with desperate tenacity.
General Rosecrans, the Federal commander-in-chief, rode amidst
his troops as they hurried in converging columns to the point of
heaviest fire, and in person hurled them fiercely against the
steadfast Confederate front. The shouts and yells and the roll of
musketry swelled the din of battle to a deafening roar. The
fighting was terrific. Walthall's Mississippians at this point
contended desperately with attacks in front and on their flank.
The Ninth Ohio, at double quick and with mighty shout, rushed
upon the captured Union battery and recovered it. The
Confederate gunners were killed by bayonets as they bravely
stood at their posts. Hour after hour the battle raged, extending
the area of its fire and the volume of its tremendous roar. Here
and there along the lines a shattered command, its leading
officers dead or wounded, was withdrawn, reorganized, and
quickly returned to its bloody work. Still farther toward the
Confederate right, Forrest again essayed to turn the Union left.
Charging as infantry, he pressed forward through a tempest of
shot and neared the Union flank, when the Federal batteries
poured upon his entire line rapid discharges of grape, canister,
and shell. Round after round on flank and

front, these deadly volleys came until Forrest's dissolving lines
disappeared, leaving heaps of dead near the mouths of the Union
guns. Reforming his broken ranks, Forrest, with Cheatham's
support, again rushed upon the Union left, the impetuous onset
bringing portions of the hostile lines to a hand-to-hand struggle.
Still there was no decisive break in the stubborn Union ranks.
Coming through woods and fields from the other wings, the
flapping ensigns marked the rapid concentration of both armies
around this vortex of battle. As the converging columns met,
bayonet clashed with bayonet and the trampled earth was
saturated with blood. Here and there the Union line was broken,
by the charges of Cheatham, Stewart, and Johnson, but was
quickly reformed and reestablished by the troops under
Reynolds. The Union commands of Carlin and Heg were swept
back before the fire at short range from the Southern muskets;
but as the Confederate lines again advanced and leaped into the
Union trenches, they were met and checked by a headlong
countercharge.

The La Fayette road along or near which the broken lines of
each army were rallied and reformed, and across which the
surging currents of fire had repeatedly rolled, became the
"bloody lane" of Chickamauga.

The remorseless war-god at this hour relaxed his hold on the
two armies whose life-blood had been flowing since early
morning. Gradually the mighty wrestlers grew weary and faint,
and silence reigned again in the shell-shivered forest. It was,
however, only a lull in the storm. On the extreme Union left the
restless Confederates were again moving into line for a last and
tremendous effort. The curtain of night slowly descended, and
the powder-blackened bayonets and flags over the hostile lines
were but dimly seen in the dusky twilight. Wearily the battered
ranks in gray moved again through the bullet-scarred woods,
over the dead bodies of their

brothers who fell in the early hours and whose pale faces told
the living of coming fate. Nature mercifully refused to lend her
light to guide the unyielding armies to further slaughter. But the
blazing muzzles of the rifles now became their guides, and the
first hour of darkness was made hideous by resounding small
arms and their lurid flashes. Here might follow a whole chapter
of profoundly interesting personal incidents. The escape of
officers of high rank, who on both sides rode with their troops
through the consuming blasts, was most remarkable; but here and
there the missiles found them. General Preston Smith, of
Tennessee, my friend in boyhood, was among the victims. A
Minié ball in search of his heart struck the gold watch which
covered it. The watch was shivered, but it only diverted the
messenger of death to another vital point. The inverted casing,
whirled for a great distance through the air, fell at the feet of a
Texan, who afterward sent it to the bereaved family. Near by
was found the Union General Baldwin, his blue uniform reddened
with his own blood and the blood of his dead comrades around
him. The carnage was appalling and sickening. "Enough of
blood and death for one day!" was the language of the bravest
hearts which throbbed with anguish at the slaughter of the 19th
and with anxiety as to the morrow's work.

Night after the battle! None but a soldier can realize the import
of those four words. To have experienced it, felt it, endured it, is
to have witnessed a phase of war almost as trying to a sensitive
nature as the battle itself. The night after a battle is dreary and
doleful enough to a victorious army cheered by triumph. To the
two armies, whose blood was still flowing long after the sun
went down on the 19th, neither of them victorious, but each so
near the other as to hear the groans of the wounded and dying in
the opposing ranks, the scene was indescribably

oppressive. Cleburne's Confederates had waded the river
with the water to their arm-pits. Their clothing was drenched and
their bodies shivering in the chill north wind through the weary
hours of the night. The noise of axe-blows and falling trees along
the Union lines in front plainly foretold that the Confederate
assault upon the Union breastworks at the coming dawn was to
be over an abatis of felled timber, tangled brush, and obstructing
tree-tops. The faint moonlight, almost wholly shut out by dense
foliage, added to the weird spell of the sombre scene. In every
direction were dimly burning tapers, carried by nurses and relief
corps searching for the wounded. All over the field lay the
unburied dead, their pale faces made ghastlier by streaks of
blood and clotted hair, and black stains of powder left upon their
lips when they tore off with their teeth the ends of deadly
cartridges. Such was the night between the battles of the 19th
and 20th of September at Chickamauga.

At nine o'clock on that Sabbath morning, September 20, as the
church bells of Chattanooga summoned its children to
Sunday-school, the signal-guns sounding through the forests at
Chickamauga called the bleeding armies again to battle. The
troops of Longstreet had arrived, and he was assigned to the
command of the Confederate left, D. H. Hill to the Confederate
right. On this latter wing of Bragg's army were the troops of
John C. Breckinridge, W. H. T. Walker, Patrick Cleburne, and
A. P. Stewart, with Cheatham in reserve. Confronting them and
forming the Union left were the blue-clad veterans under Baird,
Johnson, Palmer, and Reynolds, with Gordon Granger in reserve.
Beginning on the other end of the line forming the left wing of
Bragg's battle array were Preston, Hindman, and Bushrod
Johnson, with Law and Kershaw in reserve. Confronting these,
beginning on the extreme Union right and forming the right wing
of Rosecrans's army, were

Sheridan, Davis, Wood, Negley, and Brannan, with Wilder and
Van Cleve in reserve.

The bloody work was inaugurated by Breckinridge's assault
upon the Union left. The Confederates, with a ringing yell, broke
through the Federal line. The Confederate General Helm, with his
gallant Kentuckians, rushed upon the Union breastworks and was
hurled, back, his command shattered. He was killed and his
colonels shot down. Again rallying, again assaulting, again
recoiling, this decimated command temporarily yielded its place in
line. The Federals, in furious countercharge, drove back the
Confederates under Adams, and his body was also left upon the
field.

The Chickamauga River was behind the Confederates;
Missionary Ridge behind the Federals. On its slopes were Union
batteries pouring a storm of shell into the forests through which
Bragg's forces were bravely charging. As the Confederates
under Adams and Helm were borne back, the clear ring of Pat
Cleburne's "Forward!" was heard; and forward they moved,
their alignment broken by tree-tops and tangled brush and
burning shells. His superb troops pressed through the storm, only
to recoil under the concentrated fire of artillery and the blazing
muzzles of small arms from the Federals behind their
breastworks. The whole Confederate right, brigade after
brigade, in successive and repeated charges, now furiously
assailed the Union breastworks, only to recoil broken and
decimated. Walthall, with his fiery Mississippians, was repulsed,
with all his field officers dead or wounded and his command torn
into shreds. The gallant Georgians at once rushed into the
consuming blasts, and their brilliant leader, Peyton Colquitt, fell,
with many of his brave boys around him, close to the Union
breastworks. The Confederates under Walker, Cleburne, and
Stewart with wild shouts charged the works held by the
determined forces of Reynolds, Brannan,

and Baird. Bravely these Union troops stood to their posts,
but the Southern forces at one point broke through their front as
Breckinridge swept down upon flank and rear. George H.
Thomas, the "Rock of Chickamauga," with full appreciation of
the crisis, called for help to hold this pivotal position of the Union
left. Van Derveer's moving banners indicated the quick step of
his troops responding to Thomas's call; and raked by flanking fire,
this dashing officer drove Breckinridge back and relieved the
Union flank. At double quick and with ringing shout, the double
Union lines pressed forward until, face to face and muzzle to
muzzle, the fighting became fierce and desperate. Charging
columns of blue and gray at this moment rushed against each
other, and both were shivered in the fearful impact. The superb
Southern leader, Deshler, fell at the head of his decimated
command. Govan's Mississippians and Brown's Tennesseeans,
were forced back, when Bate, also of Tennessee, pressed
furiously forward, captured the Union artillery, and drove the
Federals to their breastworks. Again and quickly the scene was
changed. Fresh Union batteries and supporting infantry with
desperate determination overwhelmed and drove back
temporarily the Confederates led by the knightly Stewart. Still
farther westward, Longstreet drove his column like a wedge into
the Union right center, ripping asunder the steady line of the
Federal divisions. In this whirlwind of battle, amidst its thunders
and blinding flashes, the heroic Hood rode, encouraging his men,
and fell desperately wounded. His leading line was shattered into
fragments, but his stalwart supports pressed on over his own and
the Union dead, capturing the first Union line. Halting only to
reform under fearful fire, they started for the second Union
position. Swaying, reeling, almost breaking, they nevertheless
captured that second line, and drove up the ridge and over it the
Federal fighters, who

bravely resisted at every step. Whizzing shells from opposing
batteries crossed each other as they tore through the forest,
rending saplings and tumbling severed limbs and tree-tops amidst
the surging ranks. Wilder's mounted Union brigade in furious
charge swept down upon Manigault's Confederates, flank and
rear, and drove them in wild confusion; but the Union horsemen
were in turn quickly driven from the field and beyond the ridge.
Battery after battery of Union artillery was captured by the
advancing Confederates. The roaring tide of battle, with alternate
waves of success for both sides, surged around Snodgrass House
and Horseshoe Ridge. Before a furious and costly Confederate
charge the whole extreme Union right was broken and driven
from the field. Negley's shattered lines of blue abandoned the
position and retreated to Rossville with the heavy batteries. Davis,
with decimated Union lines under Carlin and Heg, moved into
Negley's position; but these were driven to the right and rear.
Onward, still onward, swept the Confederate columns; checked
here, broken there, they closed the gaps and pressed forward,
scattering Van Cleve's veterans in wild disorder. Amidst the
shouting Confederates rode their leaders, Stewart, Buckner,
Preston, Kershaw, and Johnson. The gallant McCook led in
person a portion of Sheridan's troops with headlong fury against
the Southern front; and Sheridan himself rode among his troops,
rallying his broken lines and endeavoring to check the resistless
Southern advance. The brave and brilliant Lytle of the Union
army, soldier and poet, at this point paid to valor and duty the
tribute of his heart's blood. The Confederate momentum,
however, scattered these decimated Union lines and compelled
them to join the retreating columns, filling the roads in the
rear.

Rosecrans, McCook, and Crittenden rode to Chattanooga to
select another line for defence. In the furious

tempest there now came one of those strange,
unexpected lulls; but the storm was only gathering fresh fury. In the
comparative stillness which pervaded the field its mutterings
could still be heard. Its lightnings were next to flash and its
thunders to roll around Horseshoe summit. Along that crest and
around Snodgrass House the remaining troops of Rosecrans's
left wing planted themselves for stubborn resistance--one of the
most stubborn recorded in history. To meet the assault of
Longstreet's wing, the brave Union General Brannan, standing
upon this now historic crest, rallied the remnants of Croxton,
Wood, Harker, Beatty, Stanley, Van Cleve, and Buell; but up the
long slopes the exulting
Confederate ranks moved in majestic march. As they neared the
summit a sheet of flame from Union rifles and heavy guns
blazed into their faces. Before the blast the charging
Confederates staggered, bent and
broke; reforming at the foot of the slope, these dauntless men in
gray moved again to still more determined assault upon the no
less dauntless Union lines firmly planted on the crest. Through
the blinding fires they rushed to a hand-to-hand conflict, breaking
here, pushing forward there, in terrible struggle. Through clouds
of smoke around the summit the banners and bayonets of
Hindman's Confederates were discovered upon the crest;
when Gordon Granger and Steedman, with fresh troops, hurried from
the Union left and, joining Van Derveer, hurled Hindman and his
men from this citadel of strength and held it till the final Union
retreat. With bayonets and clubbed muskets the resolute Federals
pierced and beat back the charging Confederates, covering the
slopes of Snodgrass Hill with Confederate dead. Roaring like a
cyclone through the forest, the battlestorm raged. Battery
answered battery, deepening the unearthly din and belching from
their heated throats the consuming iron hail. The woods caught
fire from the

flaming shells and scorched the bodies of dead and dying.
At the close of the day the Union forces had been driven
from every portion of the field except Snodgrass Hill,
and as the sun sank behind the cliffs of Lookout Mountain,
hiding his face from one of the bloodiest scenes enacted by
human hands, this heroic remnant of Rosecrans's army
withdrew to the rear and then to the works
around Chattanooga, leaving the entire field of Chickamauga
to the battered but triumphant and shouting Confederates.

It is not my purpose to enter the controversy as to
numbers brought into action by Bragg and Rosecrans
respectively. General Longstreet makes the strength of the
two armies practically equal; General Boynton's figures give
to Bragg superiority in numbers. It is sufficient for my purpose
to show that the courage displayed by both sides was never surpassed
in civilized or barbaric warfare; that there is glory enough to
satisfy both; that the fighting from first to last was furious;
that there was enough precious blood spilt by those charging
and recoiling columns in the deadly hand-to-hand collisions
on the 19th and 20th of September to immortalize the prowess
of American soldiery and make Chickamauga a Mecca through all the ages.1

The fact that both sides claim a victory is somewhat
remarkable. General H. V. Boynton, who fought under
General Rosecrans, to whose vigorous pen and wise
labors much credit is due for the success of the great
battle park at Chickamauga, and who is one of the ablest
and fairest of the commentators upon this memorable
struggle, has devoted much time and labor to prove that
the victory was with the Union arms. With sincere

friendship for General Boynton as a man and a soldier,
and with full appreciation of his ability and sense of justice,
I must be permitted to suggest that his reasoning will
scarcely stand the test of unbiassed historical criticism.
His theory is that although General Rosecrans abandoned the field
after two days of determined and desperate fighting in the
effort to hold it, yet his retirement was not a retreat, but an
advance. "At nightfall," says General Boynton, "the army advanced
to Chattanooga. The Army of the Cumberland was on its way
to Chattanooga, the city it set out to capture.
Every foot of it [the march] was a march in advance
and not retreat." History will surely ask how this retrograde
movement into the trenches at Chattanooga can fairly be
considered an advance, the object of which was "to capture"
the city, when that city had been
evacuated by Bragg and occupied by Rosecrans ten days
before; when it was held by the Union forces
already; and when that city was then, and had been for many
days, the base of Union supplies and operations.
General Boynton ignores the dominating fact that before
the battle the faces of the Union army were toward
Atlanta and their backs were upon Chattanooga.
The battle induced Rosecrans to "about face" and go in the
opposite direction. The same reasoning as that employed by
General Boynton would give McClellan the victory in the
seven days' battles around Richmond; for he, too, had beaten
back the Confederate at certain points, and had escaped with his
army to the cover of his gunboats at Harrison's Landing. From
like premises the Confederates might claim a victory
for Lee at Gettysburg, and that his movement to the rear
was an advance. General Pope might in like manner claim that
the rout at second Manassas was a victory, and his retreat to
Washington an advance which saved the Capitol. To my thought,
such victories are similar to that achieved by

the doctor who was asked: "Well, doctor, how is the mother and
the new baby?" "They are both dead," replied the doctor; "but I
have saved the old man." The advance on Atlanta was checked;
Chickamauga was lost; but, like the doctor's old man,
Chattanooga was saved. General Boynton is too sensitive in this
matter. All great commanders in modern times, the most
consummate and successful, have had their reverses. General
Rosecrans had unfortunate opposition at Washington, and his
record as commander under such conditions is brilliant enough to
take the sting out of his defeat at Chickamauga. His ability as
strategist, his skill in manoeuvre, and his vigor in delivering battle
are universally recognized. The high court of history will render
its verdict in accordance with the facts. These facts are simple
and indisputable. First, Bragg threw his army across Rosecrans's
front, checked his advance, and forced him to take position on
the north bank of the Chickamauga. Second, Bragg assailed
Rosecrans in his chosen stronghold, drove him from the entire
field, and held it in unchallenged possession. Third, at the end of
the two days' battle, which in courage and carnage has scarcely
a parallel, as the two wings of the Confederate army met on the
field, their battle-flags waved triumphantly above every gory acre
of it; and their ringing shouts rolled through Chickamauga's
forests and rose to heaven, a mighty anthem of praise and
gratitude to God for the victory.

CHAPTER XV

MISSIONARY RIDGE--TRIUNE DISASTER

Why General Bragg did not pursue Rosecrans after Chickamauga--Comparison
of the Confederates at Missionary Ridge with the Greeks at Marathon--The
Battle above the Clouds--Heroic advance by Walthall's Mississippians--
General Grant's timely arrival with reënforcements--The way opened to
Atlanta.

GENERAL LEE was not a believer in the infallibility of
newspapers as arbiters of military movements. With full
appreciation of their enormous power and vital agency in
arousing, guiding, and ennobling public sentiment, his experience
with them as military critics of his early campaigns in the West
Virginia mountains had led him to question the wisdom of some
of their suggestions. In a letter to Mrs. Lee he once wrote, in
half-serious, half-jocular strain, that he had been reading the
papers, and that he would be glad if they had entire control and
could fix matters to suit themselves, adding, "General Floyd has
three editors on his staff, and I hope something may be done to
please them."

General Bragg had been subjected to a somewhat similar fire
from the rear for not following General Rosecrans, after the
battle of Chickamauga, and driving him into the river or across
it. That he did not do so, and thus make the battle of Missionary
Ridge impossible and save his army from its crushing defeat
there, was a disappointment not only to the watchful and expectant

press, but to the Southern people, and to some of the
leaders who fought under him at Chickamauga. A calm review
of the situation, and the facts as they existed at the time, will
demonstrate, I think, that his failure to follow and assault General
Rosecrans in his strong works at Chattanooga was not only
pardonable, but prudent and wise. The Confederate victory at
Chickamauga, which was the most conspicuous antecedent of
Missionary Ridge, was achieved after two days of desperate
fighting and at tremendous cost. While the Confederates had
inflicted heavy losses upon the Union army, they had also
suffered heavy losses. Of the thirty-three thousand dead and
wounded, practically one half wore gray uniforms. For every
Union regiment broken and driven in disorder from the field,
there was a Confederate regiment decimated and shattered in
front of the breastworks. The final retreat of the Union army
was immediately preceded by successful repulses and
countercharges, and by the most determined stand against the
desperate and repeated Confederate assaults on Snodgrass Hill.
General Bragg's right wing had been partially shattered in front
of the Union field works in the woods at Chickamauga, and his
left wing held in check till near nightfall at Snodgrass Hill. It
seems to me, therefore, that these facts constitute almost a
mathematical demonstration--at least a moral assurance--that
his army must have failed in an immediate march across the open
plain through the network of wire spread for Confederate feet, in
the face of wide-sweeping Union artillery, and against the
infinitely stronger works at Chattanooga. In whatever other
respects General Bragg may be regarded by his critics as worthy
of blame, it seems manifestly unfair to charge that he blundered
in not pursuing Rosecrans after Chickamauga. Far more just
would be criticisms of General McClellan for his refusal to renew
the attack in the

open after Sharpsburg (Antietam), or of General Meade for not
accepting the gauge of battle tendered him by Lee after the
repulse of Gettysburg; or of General Lee himself for not
pressing Burnside after Fredericksburg, Hooker after
Chancellorsville, and Pope after the rout at second Manassas.

These reflections are submitted in the interest of truth and in
justice to General Bragg's memory. They are submitted after the
most patient and painstaking investigation, and I must confess
that they are in direct conflict with the impressions I had myself
received and the opinions which I entertained before
investigation.

One other remark as to General Bragg's halt after the
Confederate victory at Chickamauga. His beleaguering of the
Union army for a whole month in its stronghold at Chattanooga
is by no means conclusive evidence that he blundered in his
failure to immediately assault General Rosecrans in his
intrenchments. While admitting that, however shattered the ranks
of the victor, the ranks of the beaten army are always in still
worse condition, it must be remembered that assaults against
breastworks, as a rule, are most expensive operations.
Pemberton had been beaten in a series of engagements before
he was driven into his works at Vicksburg; yet with his small
force he successfully repelled for months every assault made
upon those breastworks by General Grant. General Lee's hitherto
victorious veterans recoiled before the natural battlements of the
Round Tops and Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg. On June 27,
1864, General Sherman assaulted with tremendous power the
strong position held by General Joseph E. Johnston's retreating
army; but General Sherman's loss was nearly ten for every
Confederate killed or wounded. The experience of General
Nathaniel P. Banks in his assault upon the Confederate forces
behind their breastworks at Port Hudson furnishes possibly a
still more convincing proof

of this truth. Page after page of similar illustrations might be
taken from the records of our Civil War. It may be true that
Chickamauga had brought temporary demoralization to portions
of Rosecrans's army; it may be true that General Grant did say
to General Sherman at Chattanooga, "The men of Thomas's
army have been so demoralized by the battle of Chickamauga
that I fear they cannot be got out of their trenches to assume the
offensive." But when he witnessed their superb assault upon
Missionary Ridge he must have changed his opinion. It maybe
true--it is true--that had General Bragg assailed the Union army
after Chickamauga, he would have had the advantage of the
momentum and ardor imparted to a column in a charge; but he
would also have been compelled to overcome the feeling of
security imparted to troops protected by heavy breastworks and
the increased effectiveness of their fire. General Longstreet
assailed the breastworks at Knoxville after the Chickamauga
battle; but his superb battalions were powerless before them.

General Bragg's mistake, therefore, it seems to me, was not
his decision to besiege rather than assault the Union army in
Chattanooga, but it was the weakening of his lines by detaching
for other service such large bodies as to reduce his army to a
mere skeleton of its former strength. While Bragg was reducing
his troops to an estimated force of about 25,000 men by
sending off Longstreet and Buckner and the Confederate
cavalry, General Grant, who had displaced Rosecrans and
assumed command at Chattanooga, was increasing his army in
and around that city to 100,000 or more. By his official report it
seems that after the arrival of his two corps from the East and
General Sherman's army from the West, he had on the 25th of
November, when the advance was ordered, about 86,000 men,
armed and equipped, ready for the assault. I recall no instance in

the history of our war, and few in any other war, where, on so
contracted a field, was marshalled for battle so gigantic and
puissant an army.

More than two thousand years ago occurred a scene which
Missionary Ridge recalls. On the plains of Marathon, Datis,
under the orders of King Darius, assembled his army of Persian
warriors, whose number did not differ widely from those
commanded at Chattanooga by General Grant. Confronting
Datis was the little army of the Greeks under Miltiades, the
great Athenian, in whose veins ran the blood of Hercules.
Posted along the Attican range of mountains, this little army of
Athenians looked down upon the vast hosts assembled against
them on the Marathon plain below as Bragg's small force of
Confederates stood on Missionary Ridge and the slopes of
Lookout Mountain, contemplating the magnificent but appalling
panorama of Grant's overwhelming legions moving from their
works and wheeling into lines of battle. The two scenes--the
one at Marathon, the other at Chattanooga--present other
strikingly similar features. The ground on which the respective
armies under Datis and Grant were assembled bore a close
resemblance the one to the other. Crescent-shaped Marathon,
washed by the winding bay, had its counterpart in that crescent
formed at Chattanooga by the Tennessee as it flows around the
city.

The Greeks at Marathon and the Confederates at Missionary
Ridge were each moved by a kindred impulse of self-defence.
The Athenian Republicans under Miltiades, as they stood upon
the bordering bills around Marathon, realized that the spirits of
departed Grecian heroes were hovering above them, and
resolved not to survive the loss of Athenian freedom or the
enslavement of their people. They were the foremost men of
their time. The mountain on which they stood was sacred
ground; every stone and scene was an inspiration.

The American Republicans of Southern birth and training who
stood with Bragg on Missionary Ridge were imbued with an
ardor none the less strong and sacred. At this point, however,
appear vast contrasts. The Grecian commander was to fight
Persians: the Southern leader was to meet Americans. The
hireling hordes which swarmed on the plains of Marathon served
not from choice but from compulsion. The Persian array was a
vast conglomeration of incohesive elements, imposing in aspect
but weak in determined battle: the army which Bragg was to
meet was composed of patriotic volunteers, every man impelled
by a thorough belief in the righteousness of his cause. At
Marathon it was the resolute, compact, and self-sacrificing
Grecian phalanxes against the uncertain, disjointed, and
self-seeking hordes of Persian plunderers. It was heroes against
hirelings, the glorious sons of Athenian freedom against the
submissive serfs of triumphant wrong and of kingly power. At
Missionary Ridge it was patriot against patriot, inherited beliefs
against inherited beliefs, liberty as embodied in the sovereignty of
the States against liberty as embodied in the perpetuity of the
Union. The Persians represented organized vindictiveness. The
haughty monarch Darius had resolved to wreak his vengeance
on the free people of Athens. In his besotted pride and
blasphemy, he implored the gods to give him strength to punish
these freemen of Greece. His servants were instructed
constantly to repeat to him as he gorged himself with costly
viands, "Sire, remember the Athenians!" The army and
commanders whom he sent to Marathon were fit agents for the
execution of so diabolical a purpose. Numbers, therefore, did not
count for much in the conflict with such men as Miltiades led
against them. The Federals and Confederates, however, who
met each other at Missionary Ridge, were of the same race and
of kindred

impulse. They gathered their strength and ardor from the
memories and example of the same rebelling fathers. In such a
contest numbers did tell, and gave to General Grant the moral
assurance of victory even before the battle was joined.

The Union assault on Missionary Ridge was heralded by the
"Battle above the Clouds," as the fight on Lookout Mountain is
called. Important events had transpired which precipitated that
conflict amidst the heavy vapors around Lookout Mountain.
These events rendered the capture of that citadel of strength
possible, if not easy. Nearly 10,000 Federals under General
Hooker had forced a passage of the Tennessee below Lookout
Point, driving back the two Confederate regiments, numbering
about 1000 men, commanded by the gallant Colonel Oates, of
Alabama, who fell severely wounded while making a most
stubborn resistance. The night battle at Wauhatchie had also
been fought and the small Confederate force had been defeated.
It was in this fire in the darkness that the brave little Billy
Bethune of Georgia made his debut as a soldier and his exit on
an Irishman's shoulder. The Irishman who was carrying Billy off
the field was asked by his major, "Who is that you are carrying
to the rear?" "Billy Bethune, sir." "Is he wounded?" "Yis, sir;
he 's shot in the back, sir." This was more than Billy could endure,
and he shouted his indignant answer to the Irishman, "Major, he
's an infernal liar; I am shot across the back, sir."

The Hon. John Russell Young, in his book "Around the
World with General Grant," states that this great Union general
once said: "The battle of Lookout Mountain (the'Battle above
the Clouds') is one of the romances of the war. There was no
such battle, and no action worthy to be called a battle, on
Lookout Mountain. It is all poetry."

I shall not enter into the controversy as to the rank which
should be assigned to that brief but noted conflict. Whatever
may be its proper designation, it was a most creditable affair to
both sides. Reared among the mountains, I can readily
appreciate the peculiar atmospheric conditions and the
impressive character of the scenes which met those contending
forces on the rugged mountain-side. Many times in my boyhood
I have stood upon those mountain-tops in the clear sunlight,
while below were gathered dense fogs and mists, sometimes
following the winding courses of the streams, often covering the
valleys like a vast sea and obscuring them from view. As stated
in another chapter, General Hooker was probably not apprised
of the fact that there confronted him in the forenoon only
Walthall's Mississippians,--less than 1500 men against 10,000,--
and in the afternoon only the shattered remnants of this brave
little brigade, joined by three regiments of Pettus and the small
brigade of Moore, in all probably not more than 2500 men. The
conception of moving upon an unknown force located in such a
stronghold was bold and most creditable to the high soldierly
qualities of General Hooker and the gallant men who moved at
his command through the fogs and up the steeps, where gorges
and boulders and jutting cliffs made almost as formidable
barriers as those which opposed the American soldiers at
Chapultepec. General Walthall, who commanded the little band
of resisting Confederates, was compelled to stretch them out
along the base and up the sides of the mountain until his
command covered a front so long as to reduce it practically to a
line of skirmishers. Far beyond the west flank of this attenuated
line, Hooker's plan of battle for this unique field had placed a
heavy force under enterprising and daring leaders. Up the
mountain-side the troops worked their way, clutching bushes and
the branches of trees in order to lift them

selves over the rugged ledges, firing as they rose, capturing
small bodies here and there, and driving back the stubborn little
band of Confederates. The Union lines in front and on Walthall's
right threatened to make prisoners of his men, who retreated
from ledge to ledge, pouring their fire into Hooker's troops and
directing their aim only at the flashes of the Union rifles as they
gleamed through the dense fog.

The resistance of Walthall's Mississippians was pronounced
by the distinguished Union leader, General George H. Thomas,
"obstinate"; by General Bragg, the Confederate commander-in-chief,
as "desperate," and by the brave Steedman, of the Union
army, as "sublimely heroic." More emphatic than all of these
well-merited tributes was the eloquent fact that but 600 were
left of the 1500 carried into the fight.

General Grant's arrival at Chattanooga with his
reënforcements was as timely a relief for Thomas and his
troops as the coming of Buell's forces had previously been for
the succor of General Grant's army at Pittsburg Landing or
Shiloh.

The interchange of courtesies which became so common
during the war at no time interfered with the stern demands of
duty. As General Manderson, one of the most gallant officers of
the Union army, rode near the Confederate picket-lines in front
of Chattanooga, he received a salutation almost as courteous as
they would have given to one of their Confederate generals; yet
they were ready to empty their deadly rifles into the bosoms of
his troops when they moved in battle array against them.
General Manderson himself in these words gives account of the
Confederate courtesy shown him: "A feeling of amity, almost
fraternization, had existed between the picket-lines in front of
Wood's division for many days. In the early morning of that day,
being in charge of the left of our picket-line

[Union], I received a turnout and salute from the Confederate
reserve as I rode the line." This was on the very day of the great
battle. On the river below, the Confederates would gladly have
divided their own meagre rations with any individual soldier in
Thomas's army, yet they were attempting to shoot down every
team and sink every boat which sought to bring the needed
supplies to the beleaguered and hungry commands suffering in
the city.

Major Nelson of Indiana, who, like all truly brave soldiers, has
exhibited in peace the same high qualities which distinguished
him in war, gave me the following incident, which occurred at
another point, and admirably illustrates the spirit of the best men
in the two armies. Major Nelson was himself in command of the
Union picket-lines. The Confederate officer who stood at night,
in the opposing lines near him called out:

"Hello there, Yank! Have you got any coffee over there?"

"Yes," replied Major Nelson. "Come over and get some."

"We would like to come, but there are fourteen of us on this
post."

"All right, Johnny; bring them all along. We 'll divide with you.
Come over, boys, and get your coffee."

The Johnnies accepted. At two o'clock in the morning they
sat down in the trenches with the boys in blue, and told war
jokes on each other while drinking their coffee together.
Looking at his watch, the major said:

"It's time for you Johnnies to get away from here. The
inspector will be along soon, and he will put every one of you in
prison, and me, too, if he catches us at this business."

The Confederates at once sprang to their feet and left with
this salutation:

"Good night, Yanks; we are greatly obliged to you. We
have had a nice visit and enjoyed your coffee very much. We
hope you will get a good rest to-night; we are going to give you
hell to-morrow."

When General Grant arrived at Chattanooga and had surveyed
the field, he sent an order to General Sherman, who was
rebuilding the Memphis and Charleston Railroad, to stop this
work and move his army rapidly eastward toward Chattanooga.
This order, it is said, was carried in a canoe down the Tennessee
River, over Muscle Shoals, and for a distance of probably two
hundred miles. The daring soldier who bore it was Corporal Pike,
a noted scout. On the very day of Sherman's crossing the
Tennessee at Chattanooga, Grant ordered the advance upon
Missionary Ridge. To this ridge the Confederates had been
withdrawn from their eyry on Point Lookout, and the forces of
Hooker swept down upon Bragg's left flank. Against Bragg's
other flank General Sherman's army was concentrated. In
General Grant's admirable plan of the battle, the movement by
Hooker against the Confederate left, and the attack by Thomas
upon its centre, were intended as mere demonstrations, while the
heavy columns of Sherman were to turn its right flank and
completely envelop it, thus making the capture of the bulk of
Bragg's small army probable, or rendering his retreat extremely
hazardous. But, as is often the case in battle, the unexpected
transpired. Across the line of Sherman's advance, from which
the greatest results were expected, was a railroad cut and tunnel
from which the Confederates suddenly rushed upon the head of
the Union column, checking, breaking, and routing it. In the
meanwhile, Grant, who stood on Orchard Knob opposite the
Confederate centre, had ordered Thomas to move at a given
signal and seize the Confederate rifle-pits at the base of the
ridge. As the six shots from Orchard Knob sounded the signal for
the

advance, the blue line of Thomas swept across the plain and into
the rifle-pits, making prisoners of many of the advanced
Confederate skirmishers. This movement, as above stated, like
Hooker's upon Lookout Mountain on the previous day, was
intended by General Grant only as a "demonstration," the
purpose being only to take the rifle-pits as a diversion to aid
Sherman in his attack upon Bragg's right. The seasoned veterans
of Thomas, however, were wiser in this instance, or at least
bolder, than the generals. Was it a misapprehension of orders,
was it recklessness, or was it the habit acquired in battle of never
halting when ordered forward under fire until their lines were
broken against the solid fronts of opposing forces? General Grant
was amazed when he saw those lines pass the rifle-pits in furious
charge toward the crest of Missionary Ridge. Both Thomas and
Granger denied having given the order for such a movement. It
was, however, too late to halt the troops; and most fortunate was
it for the Union army that the movement could not be recalled.
Those brave men, without orders, mounted to the summit of
Missionary Ridge, leaped into Bragg's intrenchments, piercing his
lines in the centre, doubling them to the right and left, and forcing
the front in confusion to the rear. The capture of 6000 Southern
prisoners, several pieces of artillery, and many thousand stands of
small arms was an irreparable loss to the Confederacy. In its
exhausted condition these could not be replaced by now levies
and new guns. Infinitely greater, however, was the loss of the
prestige which Bragg's army had gained by the brilliant victory at
Chickamauga just two months and five days before. Still greater
was the loss which Missionary Ridge inflicted upon the Southern
cause by opening the way to Atlanta. The bold and successful
stand made after Missionary Ridge by Bragg's forces at Ringgold
was but a temporary check to the advance of the Union forces.

As Hooker's forces moved from the mountain-top up Bragg's
left, a Confederate officer, on his Kentucky thoroughbred,
galloped into this portion of the Union line. It was young
Breckinridge, looking for his father, General John C.
Breckinridge, who was commanding a
division of Confederates. Instead of his father, he found General
James A. Williamson commanding Union troops. He lost his
Kentucky racer and exchanged his staff position for that of
prisoner of war.

General Bragg, with patriotic purpose, and with the hope that
some other commander might serve the cause more efficiently,
asked to be relieved from the command
of the army, and his request was granted. General Rosecrans
had perhaps a still more pathetic fate. He
had inaugurated and conducted against General Bragg during
the summer a strategic campaign, pronounced by
General Meigs "the greatest operation in our war." During the
progress of this campaign General George H. Thomas and the
corps commanders of the Union army
seemed unanimous and enthusiastic in the commendation and
support of it. Yet after its culmination General Rosecrans was
removed from the command of his army. From the standpoint of
unbiassed criticism the future historian will probably have some
trouble in finding sufficient reasons for this removal. It is not my
province to participate in the discussion of this interesting
question. As a soldier, however, who fought on the Southern
side, and who has studied with much interest this campaign of
General Rosecrans, I wish to leave upon record
two or three inquiries which it seems to me history must
necessarily make.

First, how was it possible for the transfer of Longstreet's
troops from Lee to Bragg to have escaped the attention of
Secretary Stanton or General Halleck? This movement was
reported to General Rosecrans by General Peck of the Union
army stationed in North Carolina.

It was suggested as probable by the Hon. Murat Halstead in the
columns of his paper. General H. V. Boynton states in the most
positive terms that Colonel Jacques, of the Seventy-third Illinois,
tried in vain for ten days to gain admittance in Washington to
communicate the fact of Longstreet's movements to Halleck and
Stanton, and then, without accomplishing it, returned in time to
fight with his regiment at Chickamauga.

Another question which history will probably ask is why no
reënforcements were sent to the Union army while Rosecrans
was in command and when Longstreet was moving to strengthen
General Bragg, and yet after Rosecrans's removal immense
reënforcements were sent, although both Longstreet and
Buckner had then been detached from that immediate vicinity.

The heavy concentration of Union forces at Chattanooga, and
the consequent defeat of Bragg's army at Missionary Ridge,
was a master stroke; but justice to General Rosecrans seems to
demand the above reflections. In the light of his previous
strategic campaign and of his fight at Chickamauga, where,
without reënforcements, he so stubbornly resisted Bragg's
assaults while both Longstreet and Buckner were present,
history will surely ask: "What would General Rosecrans probably
have accomplished with his own army heavily reënforced,
while Bragg's was reduced by the absence of both Longstreet's
and Buckner's commands?"

Missionary Ridge had added its quota of cloud to the
Confederate firmament, and intensified the gloom of the
succeeding winter. It had laid bare the Confederacy's heart to
the glistening points of Union bayonets, and vastly increased the
sufferings of the Confederate armies. Vicksburg, Gettysburg,
Missionary Ridge! Distinct defeats to different armies in
distant sections, they nevertheless constituted a common, a triune
disaster

to the Confederate cause. The great crevasses in the
Mississippi's levees constitute one agency of ruin when they
unite their floods and deluge the delta. So these breaks in the
gray lines of defence constituted, I repeat, one common defeat
to Southern arms. There is, however, this noteworthy defect in the
completeness of the simile: The Mississippi levees could be
rebuilt; the material for reconstructing them was inexhaustible;
and the waters would soon disappear without any human effort
to drive them back. The Confederacy's lines, on the contrary,
could not be rebuilt. The material for reconstructing them was
exhausted. The blue-crested flood which had broken those lines
was not disappearing. The fountains which supplied it were
exhaustless. It was still coming with an ever-increasing current,
swelling higher and growing more resistless. This triune disaster
was especially depressing to the people because it came like a
blight upon their hopes which had been awakened by recent
Confederate victories. The recoil of Lee's army from its furious
impact against the blue barrier of Meade's lines at Gettysburg
was the first break in the tide of its successes. Beginning with
the marvellous panic and rout of McDowell's troops at Bull Run
in 1861, there followed in almost unbroken succession wave
after wave of Confederate triumph. The victory of Joseph E.
Johnston over General McClellan at Seven Pines, or Fair Oaks;
the rapidly recurring victories of Lee in the seven days' battles
around Richmond over the same brilliant commander; the rout of
General Pope's army at second Manassas, or second Bull
Run; the bloody disaster inflicted by Lee upon Burnside's forces
at Fredericksburg and upon Hooker's splendid army at Chancellorsville,
together with Stonewall Jackson's
Napoleonic campaign in the Valley of Virginia, had constituted a
chain of Confederate successes with

scarcely a broken link. Even at Sharpsburg, or Antietam, in
1862, the result was of so indecisive a character as to leave that
battle among those that are in dispute. The Federals claim it as a
Union victory on the ground that Lee finally abandoned the field
to McClellan. The Confederates place it among the drawn
battles of the war, and base their claim on these facts: that
McClellan was the aggressor, and declined to renew his efforts,
although the Confederates invited him to do so by flying their
flags in his front during the whole of the following day; that
although the battle-tide swayed to and fro, with alternate onsets
and recoils on the different hotly contested portions of the field,
yet in the main the Federal assaults were successfully repelled;
that McClellan failed to drive Lee from his general line, and that
whatever advance he made against Lee was more than
counterbalanced by Jackson's capture of the entire Union forces
which held the left of the Union army at Harper's Ferry.

CHAPTER XVI

WINTER ON THE RAPIDAN

In camp near Clark's Mountain--Religious awakening--Revival services
throughout the camps--General Lee's interest in the movement--Southern
women at work--Extracts from General Lee's letters to his wife--Influence
of religion on the soldiers' character.

THE winter of 1863-64 on the banks of the Rapidan was passed
in preparation by both armies for that wrestle of giants which
was to begin in May in the Wilderness and end at Appomattox in
the following April.

My camp and quarters were near Clark's Mountain, from the
top of which General Lee so often surveyed with his glasses the
white-tented city of the Union army spread out before us on the
undulating plain below. A more peaceful scene could scarcely be
conceived than that which broke upon our view day after day as
the rays of the morning sun fell upon the quiet, wide-spreading
Union camp, with its thousands of smoke columns rising like
miniature geysers, its fluttering flags marking, at regular
intervals, the different divisions, its stillness unbroken save by an
occasional drum-beat and the clear ringing notes of bugles
sounding the familiar calls.

On the southern side of the Rapidan the scenes were, if
possible, still less warlike. In every Confederate camp chaplains
and visiting ministers erected religious altars, around which the
ragged soldiers knelt and worshipped the Heavenly Father into
whose keeping they committed

themselves and their cause, and through whose all-wise guidance
they expected ultimate victory. The religious revivals that ensued
form a most remarkable and impressive chapter of war history.
Not only on the Sabbath day, but during the week, night after
night for long periods, these services continued, increasing in
attendance and interest until they brought under religious
influence the great body of the army. Along the mountain-sides
and in the forests, where the Southern camps were pitched, the
rocks and woods rang with appeals for holiness and
consecration, with praises for past mercies and earnest prayers
for future protection and deliverance. Thousands of these brave
followers of Southern banners became consistent and devoted
soldiers of the cross. General Lee, who was a deeply pious man,
manifested a constant and profound interest in the progress of
this religious work among his soldiers. He usually attended his
own church when services were held there, but his interest was
confined to no particular denomination. He encouraged all and
helped all.

Back of the army on the farms, in the towns and cities, the
fingers of Southern women were busy knitting socks and sewing
seams of coarse trousers and gray jackets for the soldiers at the
front. From Mrs. Lee and her daughters to the humblest country
matrons and maidens, their busy needles were stitching, stitching,
stitching, day and night. The anxious commander thanked them
for their efforts to bring greater comfort to the cold feet and
shivering limbs of his half-clad men. He wrote letters expressing
appreciation of the bags of socks and shirts as they came in. He
said that he could almost hear, in the stillness of the night, the
needles click as they flow through the meshes. Every click was
a prayer, every stitch a tear. His tributes were tender and
constant to these glorious women for their labor and sacrifices
for Southern independence. His unselfish solicitude

for his men was marked and unvarying. He sent to the suffering
privates in the hospitals the delicacies contributed for his
personal use from the meagre stores of those who were anxious
about his health. If a handful of real coffee came to him, it went
in the same direction, while he cheerfully drank from his tin cup
the wretched substitute made from parched corn or beans. He
was the idolized commander of his army and at the same time
the sympathizing brother of his men.

General Fitzhugh Lee, the brilliant nephew of the great
chieftain, gives extracts from his private letters, some of which
I insert in this connection because they illustrate the character of
Robert E. Lee as a man. These excerpts are of greater value
because they are taken from letters addressed to Mrs. Lee and
meant for her eyes alone.

In 1861, from West Virginia, General Lee concluded a letter
to Mrs. Lee in these words:

I travelled from Staunton on horseback. A part of the road I
traveled over in the summer of 1840 on my return from St. Louis
after bringing you home. If any one had told me that the next
time I travelled that road would have been on my present errand
I should have supposed him insane. I enjoyed the mountains as I
rode along. The valleys are peaceful, the scenery beautiful.
What a glorious world Almighty God has given us! How
thankless and ungrateful we are!

Denied the privilege of being with his family at the Christmas
reunion, he wrote:

I shall pray the great God to shower His blessings upon you
and unite you all in His courts above . . . . Oh, that I were more
worthy and more thankful for all that he has done and continues
to do for me!

My constant prayer is to the Giver of all victory . . . . The
contest must be long and the whole country has to go through
much suffering. It is necessary we should be more humble, less
boastful, less selfish, and more devoted to right and justice to all
the world . . . . God, I hope, will shield us and give us success.

After his brilliant victory over McClellan in the seven days'
battles around Richmond, he wrote Mrs. Lee:

I am filled with gratitude to our Heavenly Father for all the
mercies he has extended to us. Our success has not been as
complete as we could desire, but God knows what is best for us.

If Wellington, the Iron Duke, ever said, as is reported: "A man
of fine Christian sensibilities is totally unfit for the position of a
soldier," he must have had in contemplation the mere soldier of
fortune--the professional soldier, and not the class of men who
fight only because duty compels them to fight. The lofty
Christian character, the simple, earnest Christian faith, the
consistent, unostentatious Christian life and humility of spirit of
both Lee and Jackson, furnish an eloquent and crushing rebuke
to Wellington's suggestions. Jackson fought while praying and
prayed while planning. Lee's heart was full of supplication in
battle, while his lips were silent. In sunshine and in storm, in
victory and in defeat, his heart turned to God. Chapter after
chapter might be filled with these extracts from his private
letters and with accounts of acts consistent with his letters,
illustrating the fact that great soldiers may be the tenderest men
and the truest Christian believers. The self-denial, the stainless
manhood, the unfaltering faith in the saving truths of the Bible,
the enormous will power, submissive as a child to God's will,--the
roundness and completeness of such a life, should be a
model and an inspiration to the young men of our whole country.

Christian men and women, indeed all who truly love this
country and realize how essential to its permanence and
freedom is the character of its citizenship, must find no little
comfort in the facts recorded in the last few
paragraphs. The reward promised by mythology to the brave
who fell in battle was a heaven, not of purity and peace, but of
continued combat with their foes and a life
of eternal revelry. Such a religion could only degrade the soldiers
who fought and increase the depravity of the people. It was a
religion of hate, of vindictiveness, of debauchery. The religious
revivals which occurred in the Southern camps, on the contrary,
while banishing
from the heart all unworthy passions, prepared the soldiers for
more heroic endurance; lifted them, in a
measure, above their sufferings; nerved them for the coming
battles; exalted them to a higher conception of duty; imbued
them with a spirit of more cheerful submission to the decrees of
Providence; sustained them with a calmer and nobler courage;
and rendered them not insensible to danger, but superior to it.
The life we now live is not the only life; what we call death is
not an eternal sleep; the soldier's grave is not an everlasting
prison, but the gateway to an endless life beyond: and this belief
in immortality should be cultivated in armies, because of the
potent influence it must exert in developing the best
characteristics of the soldier.
Aside from any regard for the purely spiritual welfare of the
men, the most enlightened nations of Europe have shown a
commendable worldly wisdom in making religious literature an
important part of an array's equipment.

No one, who calmly and fairly considers the conditions which
surrounded the soldiers of the Confederate
armies when they were disbanded and the manner in which
these men met those conditions, can doubt that their profound
religious convictions, which were deepened

in the camps, had a potent influence upon their conduct in
the trying years which followed the war. Reared under a
government of their own choosing, born and bred under laws,
State and federal, enacted by their own representatives,
habituated for four years to the watchful eyes and guarding
bayonets of army sentinels, accustomed to the restraints of the
most rigid regulations, they found themselves at the close of the
war suddenly confronted by conditions radically, totally changed.
Their State governments were overthrown; State laws were in
abeyance; of chosen representatives they had none. Sheriffs,
other officers of the court, and the courts themselves were gone.
Penniless and homeless as thousands of them were, with the
whole financial system in their States obliterated, the whole
system of labor revolutionized, without a dollar or the possibility
of borrowing, they went bravely and uncomplainingly to work.
They did not rob, they did not steal, they did not beg, they did not
murmur at their fate. With all the restraints to which they had
been subjected, both as citizens and soldiers, not only relaxed but
entirely removed, they kept the peace, lived soberly and
circumspectly, each ready to lend a helping hand to maimed and
helpless comrades or to fight again for the enforcement of law or
in defence of the restored Republic. Who will deny that these
facts, which are in no particular and in no degree over-stated, but
fall far short of the reality, demonstrate the power of religious
convictions over the conduct of these disbanded soldiers
transformed into citizens under conditions so changed, so trying,
so desperate?

CHAPTER XVII

THE WILDERNESS--BATTLE OF MAY 5

Beginning of the long fight between Grant and
Lee--Grant crosses the
Rapidan--First contact of the two armies--Ewell's
repulse--A rapid
countercharge--A strange predicament--The Union centre
broken--Unprecedented movement which saved the Confederate
troops.

LEE and Grant, the foremost leaders of the opposing armies,
were now to begin a campaign which was to be practically a
continuous battle for eleven months. Grant had come from his
campaigns in the Southwest with the laurels of Fort Donelson,
Shiloh, Vicksburg, and Missionary Ridge on his brow. Lee stood
before him with a record as military executioner unrivalled by
that of any warrior of modern times. He had, at astoundingly
short intervals and with unvarying regularity, decapitated or
caused the official "taking off" of the five previously selected
commanders-in-chief of the great army which confronted him.

A more beautiful day never dawned on Clark's Mountain
and the valley of the Rapidan than May 5, 1864.
There was not a cloud in the sky, and the broad expanse
of meadow-lands on the north side of the little river and
the steep wooded hills on the other seemed "apparelled
in celestial light" as the sun rose upon them. At an
early hour, however, the enchantment of the scene was
rudely broken by bugles and kettledrums calling Lee's
veterans to strike tents and "fall into line." The advent

of spring brought intense relief to the thinly clad and poorly
fed Confederates. The Army of Northern Virginia had suffered
so much during the preceding winter that there was general
rejoicing at its close, although every man in that army knew that
it meant the opening of another campaign and the coming of
Grant's thoroughly equipped and stalwart corps. The reports of
General Lee's scouts were scarcely necessary to our
appreciation of the fact that the odds against us were constantly
and rapidly increasing: for from the highland which bordered the
southern banks of the Rapidan one could almost estimate the
numbers that were being added to Grant's ranks by the growth
of the city of tents spreading out in full view below. The
Confederates were profoundly impressed by the situation, but
they rejected as utterly unworthy of a Christian soldiery the
doctrine that Providence was on the side of the heaviest guns
and most numerous battalions. To an unshaken confidence in
their great leader and in each other there had been added during
the remarkable religious revivals to which I have referred a
spiritual vitality which greatly increased among Lee's soldiers the
spirit of self-sacrifice and of consecration.
Committing themselves and their cause to God, with honest and
fervent prayers for His protection and guidance, they hopefully
and calmly awaited the results of the coming battle.

On the morning of May 4, 1864, shortly after midnight,
General Grant began the movement which was soon to break
the long silence of that vast and dense woodland by the roaring
tumult of battle. This advance by General Grant inaugurated the
seventh act in the "On to Richmond" drama played by the
armies of the Union. The first advance, led by General
McDowell, had been repelled by Beauregard and Johnston at
Bull Run; the next five under the leadership respectively of

McClellan, Pope, Burnside, Hooker, and Meade, had been
repelled by Lee. He had not only defeated these noted leaders,
but caused their removal from command of the Union army.

Crossing the Rapidan with but little resistance, General Grant
spent the 4th of May in placing his army in position. Pushing
toward Richmond the head of his column, which was to form
the left of his battle line, in order to throw himself, if possible,
between Lee and the Confederate capital, General Grant
promptly faced his army in the direction from which Lee must
necessarily approach and moved to the front as rapidly as the
tangled wilderness would permit. Lee, in the meantime, was
hurrying his columns along the narrow roads and throwing out
skirmish-lines, backed by such troops as he could bring forward
quickly in order to check Grant's advance and to ascertain
whether the heaviest assault was to be made upon the
Confederate centre or upon the right or left flank. Field-glasses
and scouts and cavalry were equally and almost wholly useless
in that dense woodland. The tangle of underbrush and curtain of
green leaves enabled General Grant to concentrate his forces at
any point, while their movements were entirely concealed.
Overlapping the Confederate lines on both flanks, he lost no
time in pushing to the front with characteristic vigor.

My command brought up the rear of the extreme left of
Lee's line, which was led by Ewell's corps. Long before I
reached the point of collision, the steady roll of small arms left
no doubt as to the character of the conflict in our front.
Despatching staff officers to the rear to close up the ranks in
compact column, so as to be ready for any emergency, we
hurried with quickened step toward the point of heaviest
fighting. Alternate confidence and apprehension were
awakened as the shouts of one army or the other reached our
ears. So

distinct in character were these shouts that they were easily
discernible. At one point the weird Confederate "yell" told us
plainly that Ewell's men were advancing. At another the huzzas,
in mighty concert, of the Union troops warned us that they had
repelled the Confederate charge; and as these ominous huzzas
grew in volume we know that Grant's lines were moving
forward. Just as the head of my column came within range of the
whizzing Miniés, the Confederate yells grew fainter, and at last
ceased; and the Union shout rose above the din of battle. I was
already prepared by this infallible admonition for the sight of
Ewell's shattered forces retreating in disorder. The oft-repeated
but spasmodic efforts of first one army and then the other to
break through the opposing ranks had at last been ended by the
sudden rush of Grant's compact veterans from the dense covert
in such numbers that Ewell's attenuated lines were driven in
confusion to the rear. These retreating divisions, like broken and
receding waves, rolled back against the head of my column while
we were still rapidly advancing along the narrow road. The
repulse had been so sudden and the confusion so great that
practically no resistance was now being made to the Union
advance; and the elated Federals were so near me that little time
was left to bring my men from column into line in order to resist
the movement or repel it by countercharge. At this moment of
dire extremity I saw General Ewell, who was still a superb
horseman, notwithstanding the loss of his leg, riding in furious
gallop toward me, his thoroughbred charger bounding like a deer
through the dense underbrush. With a quick jerk of his bridle-rein
just as his wooden leg was about to come into unwelcome
collision with my knee, he checked his horse and rapped out his
few words with characteristic impetuosity. He did not stop to
explain the situation; there was no need of explanation. The
disalignment, the confusion, the

rapid retreat of our troops, and the raining of Union bullets as
they whizzed and rattled through the scrub-oaks and pines,
rendered explanations superfluous, even had there been time to
make them. The rapid words he did utter were electric and
charged with tremendous significance. "General Gordon, the fate
of the day depends on you, sir," he said. "These men will save it,
sir," I replied, more with the purpose of arousing the enthusiasm
of my men than with any well-defined idea as to how we were
to save it. Quickly wheeling a single regiment into line, I ordered
it forward in a countercharge, while I hurried the other troops
into position. The sheer audacity and dash of that regimental
charge checked, as I had hoped it would, the Union advance for
a few moments, giving me the essential time to throw the other
troops across the Union front. Swiftly riding to the centre of my
line, I gave in person the order: "Forward!" With a deafening
yell which must have been heard miles away, that glorious
brigade rushed upon the hitherto advancing enemy, and by the
shock of their furious onset shattered into fragments all that
portion of the compact Union line which confronted my troops.

At that moment was presented one of the strangest conditions
ever witnessed upon a battle-field. My command covered only a
small portion of the long lines in blue, and not a single regiment
of those stalwart Federals yielded except those which had been
struck by the Southern advance. On both sides of the swath cut
by this sweep of the Confederate scythe, the steady veterans of
Grant were unshaken and still poured their incessant volleys into
the retreating Confederate ranks. My command had cut its way
through the Union centre, and at that moment it was in the
remarkably strange position of being on identically the same
general line with the enemy, the Confederates facing in one
direction, the Federals in the other. Looking down that line from

Grant's right toward his left, there would first have been seen a
long stretch of blue uniforms, then a short stretch of gray, then
another still longer of blue, in one continuous line. The situation
was both unique and alarming. I know of no case like it in
military history; nor has there come to my knowledge from
military text-books or the accounts of the world's battles any
precedent for the movement which extricated my command
from its perilous environment and changed the threatened
capture or annihilation of my troops into victory. The solid and
dotted portions of the line, here given, correctly represent the
position of my troops in relation to the Federals at this particular
juncture: the Union forces are indicated by a solid line, the
Confederates (my command) by a dotted line, and the arrows
indicate the direction in which the forces were facing.

It will be seen that further movement to Grant's rear was not
to be considered; for his unbroken lines on each side of me
would promptly close up the gap which my men had cut through
his centre, thus rendering the capture of my entire command
inevitable. To attempt to retire by the route by which we had
advanced was almost, if not equally, as hazardous; for those
same unbroken and now unopposed ranks on each side of me, as
soon as such retrograde movement began, would instantly rush
from both directions upon my retreating command and quickly
crush it. In such a crisis, when moments count for hours, when
the fate of a command hangs upon instantaneous decision, the
responsibility of the commander is almost overwhelming; but the
very extremity of the

danger electrifies his brain to abnormal activity. In such peril he
does more thinking in one second than he would ordinarily do in
a day. No man ever realized more fully than I did at that
dreadful moment the truth of the adage: "Necessity is the
mother of invention." As soon as my troops had broken through
the Union ranks, I directed my staff to halt the command; and
before the Union veterans could recover from the shock, my
regiments were moving at double-quick from the centre into file
right and left, thus placing them in two parallel lines, back to
back, in a position at a right angle to the one held a moment
before. This quickly executed manoeuvre placed one half of my
command squarely upon the right flank of one portion of the
enemy's unbroken line, and the other half facing in exactly the
opposite direction, squarely upon the left flank of the enemy's
line. This position is correctly represented by the solid (Federal)
and dotted (Confederate) lines here shown.

This done, both these wings were ordered forward, and, with
another piercing yell, they rushed in opposite directions upon the
right and left flanks of the astounded Federals, shattering them
as any troops that were ever marshalled would have been
shattered, capturing large numbers, and checking any further
effort by General Grant on that portion of the field.

Meantime, while this unprecedented movement was being
executed, the Confederates who had been previously driven
back, rallied and moved in spirited charge to the front and
recovered the lost ground. Both armies rested for the night near
the points where the first collisions of

the day had occurred. It would be more accurate to say they
remained for the night; for there was little rest to the weary men
of either army. Both sides labored all night in the dark and dense
woodland, throwing up such breastworks as were possible--a
most timely preparation for the next day's conflicts. My own
command was ordered during the night to the extreme left of
Lee's lines, under the apprehension that Grant's right overlapped
and endangered our left flank.

Thus ended the 5th of May, which had witnessed the first
desperate encounter between Grant and Lee. The fighting had
not involved the whole of either army, but it was fierce and
bloody. It would be unjust to claim that either of the famous
leaders had achieved a signal victory. Both sides had left their
dead scattered through the bullet-riddled underbrush. The
Confederates drew comfort from the fact that in the shifting
fortunes of the day theirs was the last advance, that the battle
had ended near where it had begun, and that the Union advance
had been successfully repulsed.

It was impossible to know what changes in the disposition of
his forces General Grant would make during the night. It was
useless to speculate as to whether he would mass his troops for
still heavier assault upon the positions we then held or would
concentrate against Lee's right or left flank. All that could be
done was to prepare as best we could for any contingency, and
await the developments which the morrow would bring.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE WILDERNESS--BATTLE OF MAY 6.

The men ordered to sleep on their arms--Report of scouts--
Sedgwick's exposed position--A plan proposed to flank and crush
him--General Early's objections to it--Unfounded belief that
Burnside protected Sedgwick--General Lee orders a movement in the late
afternoon--Its success until interrupted by darkness--The Government
official records prove that Early was mistaken.

THE night of the 5th of May was far spent when my
command reached its destination on the extreme
Confederate left. The men were directed to sleep on
their arms during the remaining hours of darkness.
Scouts were at once sent to the front to feel their way
through the thickets and ascertain, if possible, where
the extreme right of Grant's line rested. At early
dawn these trusted men reported that they had found
it: that it rested in the woods only a short distance in
our front, that it was wholly unprotected, and that the
Confederate lines stretched a considerable distance
beyond the Union right, overlapping it. I was so
impressed with the importance of this report and with the
necessity of verifying its accuracy that I sent others to
make the examination, with additional instructions to
proceed to the rear of Grant's right and ascertain if the
exposed flank were supported by troops held in reserve
behind it. The former report was not only confirmed
as to the exposed position of that flank, but the astounding
information was brought that there was not a supporting force
within several miles of it.

Much of this scouting had been done in the late hours of the
night and before sunrise on the morning of the 6th. Meantime,
as this information came my brain was throbbing with the
tremendous possibilities to which such a situation invited us,
provided the conditions were really as reported. Mounting my
horse in the early morning and guided by some of these
explorers, I rode into the unoccupied woodland to see for myself.
It is enough to say that I found the reports correct in every
particular. Riding back toward my line, I was guided by the
scouts to the point near which they had located the right of the
Union army. Dismounting and creeping slowly and cautiously
through the dense woods, we were soon in ear-shot of an
unsuppressed and merry clatter of voices. A few feet nearer,
and through a narrow vista, I was shown the end of General
Grant's temporary breastworks. There was no line guarding this
flank. As far as my eye could reach, the Union soldiers were
seated on the margin of the rifle-pits, taking their breakfast.
Small fires were burning over which they were boiling their
coffee, while their guns leaned against the works in their
immediate front.

No more time was consumed in scouting. The revelations had
amazed me and filled me with confident anticipations of
unprecedented victory. It was evident that General Grant had
decided to make his heaviest assaults upon the Confederate
right, and for this purpose had ordered his reserves to that flank.
By some inconceivable oversight on the part of his subordinates,
his own right flank had been left in the extremely exposed
condition in which my scouts had found it. Undoubtedly the
officer who located that battle line for General Grant or for
General Sedgwick was under the impression that there were no
Confederates in front of that portion of it; and this was probably
true at the time the location was made. That fact, however, did
not justify the officer in

leaving his flank (which is the most vulnerable part of an army)
thus unguarded for a whole night after the battle.

If it be true that in peace "eternal vigilance is the price of
liberty," it is no less true that in war, especially war in a
wilderness, eternal vigilance is the price of an army's safety.
Yet, in a woodland so dense that an enemy could scarcely be
seen at a distance of one hundred yards, that Union officer had
left the right flank of General Grant's army without even a
picket-line to protect it or a vedette to give the alarm in case of
unexpected assault. During the night, while the over-confident
Union officer and his men slept in fancied security, my men stole
silently through the thickets and planted a hostile line not only in
his immediate front, but overlapping it by more than the full
length of my command. All intelligent military critics will
certainly agree that such an opportunity as was here presented
for the overthrow of a great army has rarely occurred in the
conduct of a war. The failure to take advantage of it was even a
greater blunder than the "untimely discretion" which checked
the sweep of the Confederate lines upon the Union right on that
first afternoon at Gettysburg, or the still more fatal delay on the
third day which robbed Lee of assured victory.

As soon as all the facts in regard to the situation were fully
confirmed, I formed and submitted the plan which, if promptly
adopted and vigorously followed, I then believed and still believe
would have resulted in the crushing defeat of General Grant's
army. Indeed, the plan of battle may almost be said to have
formed itself, so naturally, so promptly and powerfully did it take
hold of my thoughts. That plan and the situation which
suggested it may be described simply and briefly:

First, there was Grant's battle line stretching for miles
through the Wilderness, with Sedgwick's corps on the

right and Warren's next, while far away on the left was
Hancock's, supported by the great body of the Union reserves.

Second, in close proximity to this long stretch of Union troops,
and as nearly parallel to it as circumstances would permit, was
Lee's line of Confederates.

Third, both of these lines were behind small breastworks
which had been thrown up by the respective armies during the
night of the 5th. On Lee's left and confronting Sedgwick was
Ewell's corps, of which my command was a part. In my
immediate front, as above stated, there was no Union force
whatever. It was perfectly practicable, therefore, for me to
move out my command and form at right angles to the general
line, close to Sedgwick's unprotected flank and squarely across
it.

Fourth, when this movement should be accomplished there
would still remain a brigade of Confederates confronting each
brigade of Federals along the established battle line. Thus the
Union troops could be held to their work along the rifle-pits,
while my command would sweep down upon the flank and
obliquely upon their rear.

As later developments proved, one brigade on the flank was
all that was needed for the inauguration of the plan and the
demonstration of its possibilities. The details of the plan were as
follows: While the unsuspecting Federals were drinking their
coffee, my troops were to move quickly and quietly behind the
screen of thick underbrush and form squarely on Sedgwick's
strangely exposed flank, reaching a point far beyond that flank
and lapping around his rear, so as to capture his routed men as
they broke to the rear. While my command rushed from this
ambush a simultaneous demonstration was to be made along his
front. As each of Sedgwick's brigades gave way in confusion,
the

corresponding Confederate brigade, whose front was
thus cleared on the general line, was to swing into the column
of attack on the flank, thus swelling at each step of our advance
the numbers, power, and momentum of the Confederate forces
as they swept down the line of works and extended another
brigade's length to the unprotected Union rear. As each of the
Union brigades, divisions, and corps were struck by such an
absolutely resistless charge upon the flank and rear, they must
fly or be captured. The effective force of Grant's army would
be thus constantly diminished, and in the same proportion the
column of attack would be steadily augmented.

Add to this inestimable Confederate advantage the panic and
general demoralization that was inevitable on the one side, and
the corresponding and ever-increasing enthusiasm that would be
aroused upon the other, and it will be admitted that I do not
overestimate the opportunity when I say that it has been rarely
equalled in any war.

As far as could be anticipated, the plan was devised to meet
every contingency. For example, as Sedgwick had no reserves
in support behind him, all having been sent to the Union left, his
only chance of meeting the sudden assault on his right and rear
was to withdraw from his intrenchments under the fire of this
flanking force and attempt to form a new line at right angle to
his works, and thus perhaps arrest the headlong Confederate
charge.

But it will be seen that his situation would then be rendered
still more hopeless, because as he changed front and attempted
to form a new line the Confederates in front of his works were
to leap from their rifle-pits and rush upon his newly exposed
flank. He would thus be inevitably crushed between the two
Confederate forces.

When Sedgwick's corps should thus be destroyed, the
fate of the next Union corps (Warren's) would surely be sealed,
for in its front would be the Confederate corps, led by that
brilliant soldier, A. P. Hill, ready to assault from that direction,
while upon its flank would be not only my two brigades, as in the
case of Sedgwick, but Ewell's entire corps, adding to the column
of attack. In practically unobstructed march around Warren's
flank Ewell would speedily envelop it, and thus the second Union
corps in the battle line would be forced to precipitate flight; or if
it attempted, however bravely, to stand its ground, it would be
inevitably crushed or captured as Ewell assailed it in rear while
Hill assaulted in front.

And so of the next corps and the next. Had no part of this
plan ever been tested, the vast results which must have attended
its execution could scarcely be doubted by any experienced
soldier. Fortunately, however, for the removal of all doubt in the
premises, it was tested--tested at an hour most unfavorable to
its success and after almost the entire day had been wasted;
tested on General Lee's approval and by his personal order and
almost in his immediate presence. The test, unfair as it was,
furnished the plainest and most convincing proof that had it been
made at an early hour in the day instead of at sundown, the 6th
of May would have ended in the crushing defeat of General
Grant's army.

Here is the test and here the results. With my own Georgia
brigade and General Robert Johnson's North Carolinians moving
by the left flank, so that we should have nothing to do, when the
proper point was reached, except to close up, to front face and
forward, we pressed through the woods as rapidly and
noiselessly as possible and halted at the point immediately
opposite Sedgwick's flank.

indicate the approximate positions occupied by the respective
armies at the beginning of my flank attack.

The Georgia brigade (Gordon's) was directed to make the
assault, and the North Carolina brigade (Johnson's) was ordered
to move farther to the Union rear and to keep as nearly as
possible in touch with the attacking force and to gather up
Sedgwick's men as they broke to the rear. As the sun went
down these troops were ordered forward. In less than ten
minutes they struck the Union flank and with thrilling yells
rushed upon it and along the Union works, shattering regiments
and brigades, and throwing them into wildest confusion and
panic. There was practically no resistance. There could be
none. The Georgians, commanded by that intrepid leader,
Clement A. Evans, were on the flank, and the North
Carolinians, led by a brilliant young officer, Robert Johnson,
were sweeping around to the rear, without a shot in their front.
There was nothing for the brave Federals to do but to fly. There
was no time given them to file out from their works and form a
new line of resistance. This was attempted again and again; but
in every instance the swiftly moving Confederates were upon
them, pouring a consuming fire into their half-formed ranks and
shivering one command after another in quick succession. The
gallant Union leaders, Generals Seymour and Shaler, rode
among their panic-stricken troops in the heroic endeavor to form
them into a new line. Their brave efforts were worse than
unavailing,

for both of these superb officers, with large numbers of
their brigades, were quickly gathered as prisoners of war in the
Confederate net; and nearly the whole of Sedgwick's corps was
disorganized.

It is due to both General Ewell and General Early to say that
they did all in their power to help forward the movement when
once begun. There was, however, little need for help, for the
North Carolina brigade, which was in the movement, had not
found an opportunity to fire or to receive a shot; and the Georgia
brigade as a whole had not been checked for a single moment
nor suffered any serious loss. These men were literally revelling
in the chase, when the unwelcome darkness put an end to it.
They were so enthused by the pursuit, which they declared to
me, as I rode among them, was the "finest frolic" they had ever
been engaged in, that it was difficult to halt them even when it
became too dark to distinguish friend from foe. With less than
sixty casualties, this brigade almost single-handed had achieved
these great results during the brief twilight of the 6th of May.
And possibly one half of the small loss that occurred was
inflicted after nightfall by Confederates who enthusiastically
charged from the front upon the Union breastworks, firing as
they came, and not realizing that my command in its swift
movement down the flank had reached that point on Sedgwick's
line. The brave and brilliant John W. Daniel, now United States
senator from Virginia, was then serving on the staff of General
Early. As he rode with me in the darkness, he fell, desperately
wounded, with his thigh-bone shattered. He narrowly escaped
death from this wound, which has maimed him for life.

It will be seen that my troops were compelled to halt at last,
not by the enemy's resistance, but solely by the darkness and the
cross-fire from Confederates. Had daylight lasted one half-hour
longer, there would not

have been left an organized company in Sedgwick's corps. Even
as it was, all accounts agree that his whole command was
shaken. As I rode abreast of the Georgians, who were moving
swiftly and with slight resistance, the last scene which met my
eye as the curtain of night shut off the view was the crumbling
of the Union lines as they bravely but vainly endeavored to file
out of their works and form a new line under the furious onset
and withering fire of the Confederates.

General Horace Porter, who served with distinction on
General Grant's staff, speaking in his book of this twilight flank
attack on the 6th of May, says: "It was now about sundown; the
storm of battle which had raged with unabated fury from early
dawn had been succeeded by a calm . . . . . Just then the stillness
was broken by heavy volleys of musketry on our extreme right,
which told that Sedgwick had been assaulted and was actually
engaged with the enemy. The attack against which the
general-in-chief during the day had ordered every precaution to be taken
had now been made . . . . . Generals Grant and Meade,
accompanied by me and one or two other staff officers, walked
rapidly over to Meade's tent, and found that the reports still
coming in were bringing news of increasing disaster. It was soon
reported that General Shaler and part of his brigade had been
captured; then that General Seymour and several hundred of his
men had fallen into the hands of the enemy; afterward that our
right had been turned, and Ferrero's division cut off and forced
back upon the Rapidan . . . . . Aides came galloping in from the
right, laboring under intense excitement, talking wildly and giving
the most exaggerated reports of the engagement. Some declared
that a large force had broken and scattered Sedgwick's entire
corps. Others insisted that the enemy had turned our right
completely and captured the wagon-train. . . . A general

officer came in from his command at this juncture and said to
the general-in-chief, speaking rapidly and laboring under
considerable excitement:'General Grant, this is a crisis that
cannot be looked upon too seriously; I know Lee's methods well
by past experience; he will throw his whole army between us
and the Rapidan and cut us off completely from our
communications.' "

This extract from General Porter's book is given merely to
show what consternation had been carried into the Union ranks
by this flank attack, which had been delayed from early morning
to sundown. The question is pertinent: What would have been
the result of that flank movement had the plan of battle
suggested been promptly accepted in the early morning and
vigorously executed, as was urged?

If we carefully and impartially consider all the facts and
circumstances, there cannot be much disagreement as to the
answer. If that one Georgia brigade, supported by the North
Carolinians, could accomplish such results in such brief space of
time, it is beyond question that the Confederate column of
attack, constantly augmented during an entire day of battle,
would have swept the Union forces from the field. Indeed, had
not darkness intervened, the Georgia and North Carolina
brigades alone would have shattered Sedgwick's entire corps;
and the brigades and divisions of Ewell, which confronted those
of Sedgwick on the general line, would have marched steadily
across to join the Georgians and North Carolinians, instead of
rushing across in the darkness, firing as they came, and
inflicting more damage upon my men than upon the enemy.

General Porter, speaking of General Grant's promptness after
dark in "relieving the situation," says: "Reenforcements were
hurried to the point attacked, and preparations made for
Sedgwick's corps to take up a

new line with the front and right thrown back." These
movements were such as were to be expected from so able a
commander as General Grant. But it will be seen that neither of
them could have been accomplished had this flank assault been
made at an early hour of the day. General Grant's army on the
other flank was so pressed that he could not have safely
weakened his force there to aid Sedgwick. Both armies on that
flank were strained to the utmost, and Lee and Grant were both
there in person, superintending the operations of their respective
forces. When night came and put an end to the fighting on his
left flank, then, and not till then, was General Grant in position to
send reënforcements to Sedgwick. Moreover, had the plan of
battle proposed to Early and Ewell been accepted, Lee, of
course, would have been fully advised of it, and of every stage
of its progress. He would, therefore, have made all his
arrangements auxiliary to this prime movement upon General
Grant's exposed right. The simple announcement to Lee of the
fact that this right flank of the Union army was entirely
unprotected, and that it was in close proximity to his unemployed
troops, would have been to that great Southern soldier the herald
of victory. He would have anticipated at once every material
and commanding event which must necessarily have followed
the embracing of so unexampled an opportunity. As soon as he
had learned that his troops were placed secretly and squarely
across Sedgwick's right, Lee could have written in advance a
complete description of the resistless Confederate charge--of the
necessary flight or capture in quick succession of the hopelessly
flanked Union commands, of the cumulative power of the
Confederate column at every step of its progress, compelling
General Grant to send large bodies of men to his right, thus
weakening his left. In front of that left was Lee in person. With
a full knowledge of the progress made by

his own flanking columns, and appreciating the
extremity in which such a movement would place the Union
commander, Lee would have lost no time in availing himself of
all the advantages of the anomalous situation. Knowing that
General Grant would be compelled to send a large part of his
army to meet the Confederate column, which had completely
turned his flank and was pressing his rear, Lee would either
have driven back the forces left in his front, thus bringing
confusion to that wing also, or he would have detached a portion
of the troops under his immediate command and sent them to
Ewell to swell the column of Confederates already in Grant's
rear, forcing him to change front and reform his whole battle
line under the most perilous conditions.

After weighing the unparalleled advantage which such a
situation would have given to such a commander as Lee, can
any impartial military critic suggest a manoeuvre which could
possibly have saved General Grant's army from crushing defeat?
If so, he will have solved the embarrassing problem which a
completely flanked and crumbling army must always meet.

The simple truth is that an army which is expending
all its strength, or even the major part of it, in repelling
attacks along its front, and permits itself to be completely
flanked, is in the utmost extremity of peril. Among the
highest military authorities there will be no dispute, I
think, as to the correctness of the proposition that
when opposing battle lines are held by forces of even
approximate strength and of equal fighting qualities,
and are commanded by officers of equal ability, the one
or the other is in a practically hopeless condition if,
while met at every point on its front, it is suddenly
startled by a carefully planned and vigorous assault
upon either its flank or rear. Its situation is still more
desperate if assaulted both in flank and rear. This is
especially true when the plan of attack is based upon

the certainty of rapidly accumulating strength in the assaulting
column. It is not too much to say that the position of an army so
flanked is absolutely hopeless unless, as in this case, the coming
of darkness intervenes to save it.

Another inquiry to which I feel compelled, in the interest of
history, to give a full and frank answer is this: Who was
responsible for the delay of nine hours or more while that
exposed Union flank was inviting our attack?

When the plan for assault was fully matured, it was presented,
with all its tremendous possibilities and with the full information
which had been acquired by scouts and by my own personal and
exhaustive examination. With all the earnestness that comes
from deep conviction, the prompt adoption and vigorous
execution of the plan were asked and urged. General Early at
once opposed it. He said that Burnside's corps was immediately
behind Sedgwick's right to protect it from any such flank attack;
that if I should attempt such movement, Burnside would assail
my flank and rout or capture all my men. He was so firmly fixed
in his belief that Burnside's corps was where he declared it to be
that he was not perceptibly affected by the repeated reports of
scouts, nor my own statement that I myself had ridden for miles
in rear of Sedgwick's right, and that neither Burnside's corps nor
any other troops were there. General Ewell, whose province it
was to decide the controversy, hesitated. He was naturally
reluctant to take issue with my superior officer in a matter about
which he could have no personal knowledge, because of the fact
that his headquarters as corps-commander were located at
considerable distance from this immediate locality. In view of
General Early's protest, he was unwilling to order the attack or
to grant me permission to make it, even upon my proposing

Meantime the roaring battle to our right was punctuating with
tremendous emphasis the folly of our delay. A. P. Hill, in impetuous
assault, had broken and hurled back almost upon General Grant's
headquarters a portion of Warren's corps. The zone of the most
furious fighting was, however, still farther off and on the
extreme right of our line, where the heaviest forces of both
armies were gathered. The almost incessant roll of musketry
indicated that the fighting was tremendous. From 4:30 o'clock in
the morning, through the entire forenoon, and until late in the
day, there had been at different points along the lines to our right
alternate and desperate assaults by the two armies, with varying
success; but not a shot was being fired near us. My troops and
the other portions of Ewell's corps were comparatively idle
during the greater part of the day, while the bloody scenes to our
right were being enacted. It is most remarkable that the
desperate struggle on that far-off flank, coupled with the stillness
on ours, failed to impress my superior officers as significant. In
the early hours of the day Hancock had pressed back the
Confederate right, doubling it up and driving it, as was asserted,
for a mile or more. Meantime Longstreet arrived with his superb
corps. Hancock was checked, and General Grant's forces, in
turn, were hurled back by the Confederate assaults. Like an
oscillating pendulum, victory was vibrating between the two
armies through all of that eventful day, while at any hour of it the
proposed movement on Sedgwick's flank by Ewell's idle
Confederates was not only perfectly feasible, but full of promise
to the Confederate army.

After Jenkins was killed and Longstreet had been carried
back on a litter, seriously wounded, General Lee's attention was
necessarily confined to that portion

of the field where General Grant was superintending his own
aggressive operations. This was one of the crises when General
Lee took personal command of his troops; and as Gregg's
superb brigade of Texans pressed to the front, the
commander-in-chief spurred his horse through a gap in the trenches and
attempted to go with them. As these brave men recognized
General Lee, a ringing protest ran down the line, and they at last
compelled him to yield to their entreaties: "Go back, General
Lee; go back!"

General Grant during that day was full of apprehension that
Ewell would attempt some offensive tactics against Sedgwick,
while Lee was wondering why it was not done. Lee knew that it
ought to be done, as will appear later, if for no other object than
to divert Grant's attention from his prime purpose and thus bring
incidental relief to Longstreet and the other heavily pressed
Confederates far off to our right. General Horace Porter, in his
"Campaigning with Grant," more than once refers to General
Grant's uneasiness about Sedgwick. He says: "The general-in-chief
was devoting a good deal of thought to our right, which had
been weakened." Well might General Grant be apprehensive.
Had he been fully apprised of that strangely exposed flank of his
army, he would have been impelled to send troops to protect
Sedgwick's right. On the other hand, had Lee been advised, as
he should have been, of the reports of my scouts and of myself,
he would not have delayed the proposed movement against
Sedgwick's flank a moment longer than was necessary to give
an order for its execution. The correctness of this opinion as to
what Lee would have done is based not merely upon the
knowledge which every officer in his army possessed of his
mental characteristics, but upon his prompt action when at last
he was informed of the conditions as they had existed for more
than nine hours.

Both General Early and I were at Ewell's headquarters
when, at about 5:30 in the afternoon, General Lee rode
up and asked: "Cannot something be done on this flank
to relieve the pressure upon our right?" After listening
for some time to the conference which followed this
pointed inquiry, I felt it my duty to acquaint General
Lee with the facts as to Sedgwick's exposed flank, and
with the plan of battle which had been submitted and
urged in the early hours of the morning and during the
day. General Early again promptly and vigorously
protested as he had previously done. He still steadfastly
maintained that Burnside's corps was in the woods
behind Sedgwick's right; that the movement was too
hazardous and must result in disaster to us. With as
much earnestness as was consistent with the position of
junior officer, I recounted the facts to General Lee, and
assured him that General Early was mistaken; that I
had ridden for several miles in Sedgwick's rear, and that
neither Burnside's corps nor any other Union troops
were concealed in those woods. The details of the
whole plan were laid before him. There was no doubt
with him as to its feasibility. His words were few, but
his silence and grim looks while the reasons for that
long delay were being given, and his prompt order to me
to move at once to the attack, revealed his thoughts
almost as plainly as words could have done. Late as it
was, he agreed in the opinion that we could bring havoc
to as much of the Union line as we could reach before
darkness should check us. It was near sunset, and too
late to reap more than a pittance of the harvest which
had so long been inviting the Confederate sickle.

Where was General Burnside on the morning of the 6th?
Where was he during the entire day?

General Early never yielded his convictions that had I been
permitted to attack Sedgwick's exposed right flank in the
morning, the movement would have led to Confederate

disaster, because of the presence of Burnside behind
that flank. He was so thoroughly satisfied of this that in his book,
written and published since the war, he insists: "Burnside's
corps was in rear of the enemy's flank on which the attack was
suggested." In the years that have passed I have made no effort
to controvert General Early's opinions in this matter. Now,
however, the time has come when the publication of my own
reminiscences makes it necessary for me to speak. The recent
printing by the Government of the War Records makes public
the official reports of the Federal officers who fought in the
Wilderness on that 6th of May. I shall quote only from Federal
officers or Northern history.

In his report General Hancock says: "I am not aware what
movements were made by General Burnside near Parker's store
on the morning of the 6th, but I experienced no relief from the
attack I was informed he would make across my front--movement
long and anxiously waited for . . . . . During the night of
the 5th I received orders to move on the enemy again at 5 A.M.
on the 6th." He adds that his orders informed him that his right
would be relieved by an attack of other troops, among them
"two divisions . . . . . under General Burnside." It will be remembered
that Hancock held the extreme left of Grant's army. Burnside
was there with Hancock. This officer describes the places and
times where and when Burnside was to move, and adds: "The
same despatch directed me to attack simultaneously with
General Burnside."

This was during the morning hours. Later in the day General
Meade locates him thus: "Soon after Hancock fell back, about
2 P.M., Burnside attacked toward the Orange plank road to the
right and in advance of Hancock's position."

General Grant himself (speaking of Burnside's movements)
says in his official report: "By six o'clock of the

morning of the 6th he was leading his corps into action near
Wilderness Tavern," etc.

Swinton, in his history of "The Army of the Potomac," says:
"The Union line as formed by dawn of the 6th was therefore in
the order of Sedgwick on the right, next Warren, and Burnside
and Hancock on the left."

General Porter says: "At four o'clock the next morning, May
6, we were awakened in our camp by the sound of Burnside's
men moving along the Germanna road. They had been marching
Since 1 A.M., hurrying on to reach the left of Warren." He
adds: "The general now instructed me to ride out to Hancock's
front, inform him of the progress of Burnside's movement," etc.
This was early on the morning of the 6th, and Hancock and
Burnside were on the extreme left. It is established, therefore,
beyond question that Burnside was not in rear of Sedgwick
when I insisted upon attacking that exposed right flank in the
early morning. He was not there at all during the entire day. He
was on the other flank of Grant's army morning, noon, and
evening. The Federal reports so locate him, and there can be no
longer any dispute as to Burnside's locality, upon which the
entire controversy rests.

General Early, in his book, states that General Ewell agreed
with him as to the impolicy of making the morning flank attack
which I so earnestly urged. Alas! he did; and in the light of
revelations subsequently made by Union officers, no intelligent
military critic, I think, will fail to sympathize with my lament,
which was even more bitter than at Gettysburg, over the
irreparable loss of Jackson. But for my firm faith in God's
Providence, and in His control of the destinies of this Republic, I
should be tempted to imitate the confident exclamation made to
the Master by Mary and Martha when they met Him after the
death of Lazarus: "Hadst thou been here, our brother had not
died." Calmly reviewing the indisputable facts which made the
situation at Gettysburg

and in the Wilderness strikingly similar, and considering them
from a purely military and worldly standpoint, I should utter my
profoundest convictions were I to say: "Had Jackson been
there, the Confederacy had not died." Had he been at
Gettysburg when a part of that Second Corps which his genius
had made famous had already broken through the protecting
forces and was squarely on the Union right, which was melting
away like a sand-bank struck by a mountain torrent; when the
whole Union battle line that was in view was breaking to the
rear; when those flanking Confederates in their unobstructed
rush were embarrassed only by the number of prisoners--had
Jackson been there then, instead of commanding a halt, his only
order would have been, "Forward, men, forward!" as he
majestically rode in their midst, intensifying their flaming
enthusiasm at every step of the advance.

Or had he been in the Wilderness on that fateful 6th of May,
when that same right flank of the Union army was so strangely
exposed and was inviting the assault of that same portion of his
old corps, words descriptive of the situation and of the plan of
attack could not have been uttered fast enough for his impatient
spirit. Jackson's genius was keener-scented in its hunt for an
enemy's flank than the most royally bred setter's nose in search
of the hiding covey. The fleetest tongue could not have narrated
the facts connected with Sedgwick's position before Jackson's
unerring judgment would have grasped the whole situation. His
dilating eye would have flashed, and his laconic order, "Move at
once, sir," would have been given with an emphasis prophetic of
the energy with which he would have seized upon every
advantage offered by the situation. But Providence had willed
otherwise. Jackson was dead, and Gettysburg was lost. He was
not now in the Wilderness, and the greatest opportunity ever
presented to Lee's army was permitted to pass.

CHAPTER XIX

RESULTS OF THE DRAWN BATTLES

General Grant the aggressor--Failure to dislodge Lee--An exciting night
ride--Surrounded by Federal troops--A narrow escape in the
darkness--General Lee's comments on the assault upon Sedgwick--A
remarkable prediction as to General Grant's next movement.

IN the thirty hours, more or less, which elapsed from the
beginning of the struggle on the 5th of May to its close after
dark on the 6th, there was, during the night which intervened, a
period of about eleven hours in which the fighting was
suspended. In addition to this, the intervals between the
successive assaults and the skirmishing consumed, perhaps, in
all, some eight or nine hours, leaving in round numbers about
ten hours of uninterrupted, continuous battle. When it is
remembered that the aggregate losses on the two sides
amounted in killed and wounded to twenty thousand, it will be
seen that these Americans were shooting each other down at
the rate of two thousand per hour; and yet at no time or place
during these hours was one half of the two lines in actual
strenuous battle.

As at Gettysburg, so in this prolonged struggle of the 5th and
6th of May, there was a series of desperate battles; but, unlike
Gettysburg, this engagement brought to neither army any
decided advantage. Both had successes, both corresponding
reverses.

more complete analysis of the two days' happenings on those
battle lines, and to consider the resulting situation on the night of
the 6th, will, in order to determine on which side was the weight
of victory, take into account the following facts: namely, that
General Grant was the aggressor; that his purpose was to drive
Lee before him; that this was not accomplished; that both armies
camped on the field; that Lee only left it when Grant moved to
another field; and that both days ended with a Confederate
victory won by the same Confederate troops.

His gifted staff officer states that General Grant, during this
last day of alternate successes and reverses, smoked twenty
large, strong Havana cigars. In after years, when it was my
privilege to know General Grant well, he was still a great
smoker; but if the nervous strain under which he labored is to be
measured by the number of cigars consumed, it must have been
greater on the 6th of May than at any period of his life, for he is
said never to have equalled that record. As General Lee did not
smoke, we have no such standard by which to test the tension
upon him. I apprehend, however, that his pulses also were
beating at an accelerated pace, for he and General Grant were
for the first time testing each other's mettle.

The night of the 6th passed without alarms on the picket-lines
or startling reports from scouts; but a short time after darkness
had brought an end to my attack on Sedgwick's corps, I myself
had an exceptionally exciting experience--a cautious ride to the
front and a madcap ride to the rear. I had ordered a force to
move a short distance nearer to the enemy and deploy a
protecting line of pickets across my front. This movement was
so difficult in that dense thicket at night that the task was both
dangerous and slow. The officer in charge was to notify me
when the line was in position.

I waited impatiently for this notification, and as it did not reach
me as soon as expected, I decided to ride slowly to the front and
in person superintend the deployment.

Taking with me but one courier, William Beasley of Lagrange,
Georgia, who had been in his boyhood the constant companion
of his father, Dr. Beasley, in the fox chase, and who had thus
become an experienced woodsman, I rode cautiously in the
general direction taken by my picket force. There was no
moonlight, but the night was cloudless and the stars furnished
enough light for us to ride without serious difficulty through the
woods. It was, however, too dark for us readily to distinguish the
color of uniforms. Before we had proceeded far we rode into a
body of men supposed to be the troops whom I had sent out on
picket. There was no sort of deployment or alignment, and I was
considerably annoyed by this appearance of carelessness on the
part of the officer, to whom I had given special instructions. But
before I had time to ascertain what this indifference to orders
meant, my trusted courier, whose sight was clearer than mine at
night, said to me in a whisper, "General, these are not our men;
they are Yankees." I replied, "Nonsense, Beasley," and rode on,
still hoping to ascertain the reason for this inexcusable huddling
of my pickets. Beasley, however, was persistent, and, taking
hold of my arm, asserted in the most emphatic manner, "I tell
you, General, these men are Yankees, and we had better get
away from here." His earnestness impressed me, especially as
he strengthened his assertion by calling my attention to the fact
that even in the dim starlight the dark blue of the uniforms
around us presented a contrast with those we were wearing. I
cautioned him to be quiet and keep close to me as I began to
turn my horse in the opposite direction. Meantime, and at the
moment we discovered

our alarming position, we heard the startling calls from Union
officers close by us, who were endeavoring to disentangle the
confused mass of men: "Rally here,--New York." "Let all the
men of the - - - - - - Regiment of Pennsylvania form here." Up to this
moment not the slightest suspicion seemed to have been
entertained by these men that Beasley and I were Confederates;
and, apparently for the sole purpose of ascertaining to what
Union command we belonged, an officer with his sword in his
hand asked in the most courteous manner to what brigade we
were attached, evidently hoping to aid us in finding it. Both
Beasley and I were, of course, deaf to his inquiry, and continued
to move on without making any reply, turning our horses' heads
toward the gray lines in which we would feel more at home.
Either our strange silence or our poorly concealed purpose to got
away from that portion of the Wilderness aroused his suspicions,
and the officer called to his comrades as we rode away from
him, "Halt those men!" His orders were scarcely uttered when
the "boys in blue" rushed around us, shouting, "Halt, halt!" But
the company in which we found ourselves was not congenial and
the locality was not at that moment a good place for us to halt.
We had to go, and go instantly, back to our own lines or to a
Northern prison. I instantly resolved to take the risk of escape,
though we might be shot into mincemeat by the hundreds of rifles
around us. Beasley was well mounted, and I was riding a
thoroughbred stallion, the horse General Shaler rode when he
was made prisoner a few hours previous. Both Beasley and I
were fairly good riders. Instantly throwing my body as far down
on my horse's side as possible, my right foot firmly fixed in the
stirrup, my left leg gripping the saddle like an iron elbow, I seized
the bridle-rein under my horse's neck, planted my spur in his
flank, and called, "Follow

me, Beasley!" This courier had intuitively followed the
motion of my body, and was clinging like an experienced
cowboy to the side of his horse. As the superb animal which I
rode felt the keen barb of the spur, he sprang with a tremendous
bound through the dense underbrush and the mass of startled
soldiers. It seems probable that the Union men were in almost
as much danger from the hoofs of our horses as we were from
the Union rifles.

Strange as our escape may seem, it will be readily understood
when it is remembered that the whole affair, like a sudden flash
in the darkness, was so unexpected and so startling as
completely to bewilder these men, and that they were crowded
so closely together that it was difficult to shoot at us without
shooting each other. In our flight we seemed to outstrip the
bullets sent after us; for neither Beasley nor myself nor our
horses were hit, although the roll of musketry was like that from
a skirmish line. With the exception of bruises to shins and scalps,
the only serious damage done was that inflicted upon our
clothing by the bristling chinquapins and pines, through which we
plunged at so furious a rate.

The impressive feature of that memorable night was the
silence that succeeded the din of battle. The awe inspired by the
darkness and density of the woods, in which two great armies
rested within hailing distance of each other, was deepened by
the low moans of the wounded, and their calls for help, as the
ambulance corps ministered to blue and gray alike. And yet
these harrowing conditions, which can never be forgotten, did
not compare in impressiveness with those at the other end of the
lines. As already explained, the battle's storm-centre was on our
right flank. The diameter of its circling and destructive currents
did not exceed, perhaps, one and a half miles; but the amount of
blood spilt has not often been equalled in so circumscribed

an area. The conditions were not favorable for the use
of artillery; but the few batteries used left their impress on the
forest and the imaginations of the men. The solid shot slashed the
timber, and the severed tree-tops or branches dropped upon the
surging lines, here and there covering, as they fell, the wounded
and the dead. The smaller underbrush in that zone of fire was
everywhere cut and scarred, and in some places swept down by
the terrific hail from small arms. Bloody strips from soldiers'
shirts hung upon the bushes, while, to add to the accumulation of
horrors, the woods caught fire, as at Chickamauga, and the
flames rapidly spread before a brisk wind, terrifying the disabled
wounded and scorching the bodies of the slain.

On the morning of May 7, I was invited by the commanding
general to ride with him through that portion of the sombre
woodland where the movement of my troops upon the Union
right had occurred on the previous evening. It will be
remembered that the plan of that battle was entirely my own, and
that its execution had been delayed until my statement of the
facts to General Lee, in the presence of Generals Ewell and
Early, secured from the commander-in-chief the order for the
movement. The reasons which impel me to refrain from giving
General Lee's comments in this connection will therefore be
appreciated. I shall be pardoned, however, and, I think, justified
by all fair-minded men if I say that although nothing could
compensate the Confederate cause for that lost opportunity, yet
his indorsement of the plan was to me personally all that I could
desire.

It would be a matter of profound interest if all that General
Lee said on this ride could be placed upon record. This I could
not venture to undertake; but I may state, without fear of
misleading, that his comments upon the situation were full and
free. He discussed the dominant characteristics of his great
antagonist: his indomitable

will and untiring persistency; his direct method of waging war by
delivering constant and heavy blows upon the enemy's front
rather than by seeking advantage through strategical manoeuvre.
General Lee also said that General Grant held so completely and
firmly the confidence of the Government that he could command
to any extent its limitless resources in men and materials, while
the Confederacy was already practically exhausted in both. He,
however, hoped--perhaps I may say he was almost convinced--
that if we could keep the Confederate army between General
Grant and Richmond, checking him for a few months longer, as
we had in the past two days, some crisis in public affairs or
change in public opinion at the North might induce the authorities
at Washington to let the Southern States go, rather than force
their retention in the Union at so heavy a cost.

I endeavored to learn from General Lee what movements he
had in contemplation, or what he next expected from General
Grant. It was then, in reply to my inquiry, that I learned for the
first time of his intention to move at once to Spottsylvania.
Reports had reached me to the effect that General Grant's army
was retreating or preparing to retreat; and I called General Lee's
attention to these rumors. He had heard them, but they had not
made the slightest impression upon his mind. He admitted that
his own scouts had made to him some such statement, but said
that such rumors had no foundation, except in the moving to the
rear of General Grant's ambulances and wagon-trains, with the
necessary forces for protection. Indeed, he said in so many
words: "General Grant is not going to retreat. He will move his
army to Spottsylvania."

I asked him if he had information of such contemplated
change by General Grant, or if there were special evidences of
such purpose. "Not at all," said Lee, "not at

all; but that is the next point at which the armies will meet.
Spottsylvania is now General Grant's best strategic point. I am so
sure of his next move that I have already made arrangements to
march by the shortest practicable route, that we may meet him
there." If these are not his exact words, they change in no sense
the import of what he did say. These unhesitating and emphatic
statements as to Grant's purposes were made by Lee as if based
on positive knowledge and not upon mere speculation; and the
reasons given by him for his conclusions as to Grant's next move
illustrate the Confederate chieftain's wonderful foresight as well
as his high estimate of the Union commander as a soldier.

General Horace Porter, of General Grant's staff, says: "At
6:30 the general issued his orders to prepare for a night march of
the entire army toward Spottsylvania Court-house."

Let it be remembered that this announcement by General
Grant of his purpose was made at 6:30 A.M. on the 7th, and that
General Lee's prediction was uttered on the same morning and
at nearly the same hour, when there was no possibility of his
having gained any direct knowledge of his antagonist's intentions.
It was uttered many hours before General Stuart, the
Confederate cavalry commander, had informed General Lee of
the movement of Union wagon-trains southward, which
movement served only to verify the accuracy with which he had
divined General Grant's purposes and predicted his next
manoeuvre.

This notable prophecy of General Lee and its fulfilment by
General Grant show that the brains of these two foemen had
been working at the same problem. The known quantities in that
problem were the aims of Grant to crush Lee and capture
Richmond, to which had been added the results of the last two
days' fighting. The unknown quantity which both were
endeavoring to find

was the next movement which the aggressor would probably
make. Grant stood in his own place and calculated from his own
standpoint; Lee put himself in Grant's place and calculated from
the same standpoint: and both found the same answer--Spottsylvania.

Having reached the same conclusion, both acted upon it with
characteristic promptness; and then there was a race between
them. Leaving their respective pioneer corps to bury the dead,
and the surgeons and nurses to care for the wounded, they
pressed toward the goal which their own convictions had
set before them.

CHAPTER XX

SPOTTSYLVANIA

General Lee's prophecy fulfilled--Hancock's assault on May 12--One of his
greatest achievements--General Lee to the head of the column--Turned back
by his own men--Hancock repulsed--The most remarkable battle of the war--
Heroism on both sides.

THE first battles in the Wilderness were the grim heralds of
those that were to follow, and both armies knew it. These
experienced soldiers were too intelligent not to understand that a
campaign was now inaugurated which was to end in the
practical destruction of one army or the other. The conditions
around them were not greatly changed by the change of locality.
They were still in the woods, but these were less dense and
were broken by fields and open spaces in which there was room
for manoeuvre and the more effective handling of artillery.

The meeting of the advance-guards at Spottsylvania was the
fulfilment to the letter of Lee's remarkable prophecy. As the
heads of the columns collided, the armies quickly spread into
zigzag formation as each brigade, division, or corps struck its
counterpart in the opposing lines. These haphazard collisions,
however, rapidly developed a more orderly alignment and
systematic battle, which culminated in that unparalleled struggle
for the possession of a short line of Lee's breastworks. I say
unparalleled, because the character of the

fighting, its duration, and the individual heroism exhibited have
no precedent, so far as my knowledge extends, in our Civil War,
or in any other war.

During these preliminary and somewhat random
engagements, General Lee, in order to secure the most
advantageous locality offered by the peculiar topography of the
country, had placed his battle line so that it should conform in
large measure to the undulations of the field. Along the brow of
these slopes earthworks were speedily constructed. On one
portion of the line, which embraced what was afterward known
as the "Bloody Angle," there was a long stretch of breastworks
forming almost a complete semicircle. Its most advanced or outer
salient was the point against which Hancock made his famous
charge.

My command had been withdrawn from position in the
regular line, and a rôle was assigned me which no officer could
covet if he had the least conception of the responsibilities
involved. I was ordered to take position in rear of that salient,
and as nearly equidistant as practicable from every point of the
wide and threatened semicircle, to watch every part of it, to
move quickly, without waiting for orders, to the support of any
point that might be assaulted, and to restore, if possible, any
breach that might be made. We were reserves to no one
command, but to all commands occupying that entire stretch of
works. It will be seen that, with no possibility of knowing when
or where General Grant would make his next effort to penetrate
our lines, the task to be performed by my troops was not an easy
one, and that the tension upon the brain and nerves of one upon
whom rested the responsibility was not light nor conducive to
sleep. No serious breach of the lines occurred until the 10th,
when a heavy column of Federals swept over the Confederate
breastworks and penetrated some distance in their rear.

Burnside was at this time operating on Lee's right
wing, while Warren, Hancock, and Mott concentrate upon our
centre and assaulted with immense vigor. Warren and Mott
were both driven back with heavy loss, but the gallant Union
commander, Upton, broke over the Confederate breastworks,
capturing artillery
and prisoners, and was sweeping in column to our rear. It was
a critical moment, but my troops in reserve
being quickly joined by those of Daniel and Steuart, were thrown
across Upton's front, and at the command "Fire!" the
Confederates poured consuming volleys into the Union ranks,
wounding General Upton, shattering
his forces, retaking the captured artillery, and reëstablishing
Lee's lines. General Daniel was killed while leading his men with
characteristic impetuosity. The fighting on the 10th of May at
Spottsylvania ended with this charge by the Federals and their
bloody repulse, in
which more than 5000 dead and wounded were left in front of
the Confederate works. On the same day, but on a different
field, the South sustained a great loss in
the death of General J. E. B. Stuart, who was killed in a cavalry
fight with Sheridan's command at Yellow Tavern, Virginia,
within a few miles of the Confederate capital. Stuart had few
equals as a commander of cavalry on either side or in any war,
and his fall was a serious blow to that branch of Lee's army.
Stuart's temperament, his exuberance of spirit, his relish for
adventure, and his readiness of resource in extremity, added to a
striking personality and charm of manner which greatly
enhanced his influence over his men, combined to make him an
ideal leader for that dashing arm
of the service. General Lee and his whole army, as well as the
authorities at Richmond, were profoundly grieved at his fall. As
soon as his death was reported, General Lee at once withdrew
to his tent, saying: "I can scarcely think of him without
weeping."

Night and day my troops were on watch or moving. At one
point or another, there was almost continuous fighting; but in
comparison with what followed, this was only the muttering of a
storm that was to break with almost inconceivable fury on the
morning of the 12th of May.

During the night preceding May 12, 1864, the report, brought
by scouts of some unusual movements in General Grant's army
left little doubt that a heavy blow was soon to fall on some
portion of the Confederate lines; but it was impossible to obtain
reliable information as to whether it was to descend upon some
part of that wide and long crescent or upon one of the wings. It
came at last where it was perhaps least expected--at a point on
the salient from which a large portion of the artillery had been
withdrawn for use elsewhere.

Before daylight on May 12th the assault was made by
Hancock, who during the night had massed his corps close to
that extreme point of the semicircle which was held by the
command of General Edward Johnson of Virginia. For several
hours after sunrise dense clouds obscured the sun, and a heavy
mist, which almost amounted to a rain, intensified the gloom.

At about 4:30 or 5 A.M. a soldier, one of the vedettes stationed
during the night at different points to listen for any unusual
sounds, came hurriedly in from the front and said to me:
"General, I think there 's something wrong down in the woods
near where General Edward Johnson's men are."

"Why do you think so? There 's been no unusual amount of
firing."

"No, sir; there 's been very little firing. But I tell you, sir, there
are some mighty strange sounds down there--something like
officers giving commands, and a jumble of voices."

strapped on the officers' horses and cartridge-boxes on the men,
report after report in quick succession reached me, each adding
its quota of information; and finally there came the positive
statement that the enemy had carried the outer angle on General
Edward Johnson's front and seemed to be moving in rear of our
works. There had been, and still were, so few discharges of
small arms (not a heavy gun had been fired) that it was difficult
to believe the reports true. But they were accurate.

During the night Hancock had massed a large portion of
General Grant's army in front of that salient, and so near to it
that, with a quick rush, his column had gone over the
breastworks, capturing General Edward Johnson and General
George Steuart and the great body of their men before these
alert officers or their trained soldiers were aware of the
movement. The surprise was complete and the assault
practically unresisted. In all its details--its planning, its execution,
and its fearful import to Lee's army--this charge of Hancock was
one of that great soldier's most brilliant achievements.

Meantime my command was rapidly moving by the flank
through the woods and underbrush toward the captured salient.
The mist and fog were so heavy that it was impossible to see
farther than a few rods. Throwing out in front a small force to
apprise us of our near approach to the enemy, I rode at the head
of the main column, and by my side rode General Robert
Johnson, who commanded a brigade of North Carolinians. So
rapidly and silently had the enemy moved inside of our works--
indeed, so much longer time had he been on the inside than the
reports indicated--that before we had moved one half the
distance to the salient the head of my column butted squarely
against Hancock's line of battle. The men who had been placed
in our front to give warning were against that battle line before
they knew it. They were shot down or made

prisoners. The sudden and unexpected blaze from Hancock's
rifles made the dark woodland strangely lurid. General Johnson,
who rode immediately at my side, was shot from his horse,
severely but not, as I supposed, fatally wounded in the head. His
brigade was thrown inevitably into great confusion, but did not
break to the rear. As quickly as possible, I had the next ranking
officer in that brigade notified of General Johnson's fall and
directed him at once to assume command. He proved equal to
the emergency. With great coolness and courage he promptly
executed my orders. The Federals were still advancing, and
every movement of the North Carolina brigade had to be made
under heavy fire. The officer in charge was directed to hastily
withdraw his brigade a short distance, to change front so as to
face Hancock's lines, and to deploy his whole force in close
order as skirmishers, so as to stretch, if possible, across the
entire front of Hancock. This done, he was ordered to charge
with his line of skirmishers the solid battle lines before him. His
looks indicated some amazement at the purpose to make an
attack which appeared so utterly hopeless, and which would
have been the very essence of rashness but for the extremity of
the situation. He was, however, full of the fire of battle and too
good a soldier not to yield prompt and cheerful obedience. That
order was given in the hope and belief that in the fog and mists
which concealed our numbers the sheer audacity of the
movement would confuse and check the Union advance long
enough for me to change front and form line of battle with the
other brigades. The result was not disappointing except in the
fact that Johnson's brigade, even when so deployed, was still too
short to reach across Hancock's entire front. This fact was soon
developed: not by sight, but by the direction from which the
Union bullets began to come.

When the daring charge of the North Carolina brigade had
temporarily checked that portion of the Federal forces struck by
it, and while my brigades in the rear were being placed in
position, I rode with Thomas G. Jones, the youngest member of
my staff, into the intervening woods, in order, if possible, to
locate Hancock more definitely. Sitting on my horse near the line
of the North Carolina brigade, I was endeavoring to get a view of
the Union lines, through the woods and through the gradually
lifting mists. It was impossible, however, to see those lines; but,
as stated, the direction from which they sent their bullets soon
informed us that they were still moving and had already gone
beyond our right. One of those bullets passed through my coat
from side to side, just grazing my back. Jones, who was close to
me, and sitting on his horse in a not very erect posture, anxiously
inquired: "General, did n't that ball hit you?"

"No," I said; "but suppose my back had been in a bow like
yours? Don't you see that the bullet would have gone straight
through my spine? Sit up or you 'll be killed."

The sudden jerk with which he straightened himself, and the
duration of the impression made, showed that this ocular
demonstration of the necessity for a soldier to sit upright on his
horse had been more effective than all the ordinary lessons that
could have been given. It is but simple justice to say of this
immature boy that even then his courage, his coolness in the
presence of danger, and his strong moral and mental
characteristics gave promise of his brilliant future.

The bullets from Hancock's rifles furnished the information
which I was seeking as to the progress he had made within and
along our earthworks. I then took advantage of this brief check
given to the Union advance, and placed my troops in line for a
countercharge,

upon the success or failure of which the fate of the Confederate
army seemed to hang. General Lee evidently thought so. His
army had been cut in twain by Hancock's brilliant coup de main.
Through that wide breach in the Confederate lines, which was
becoming wider with every step, the Union forces were rushing
like a swollen torrent through a broken mill-dam. General Lee
knew, as did every one else who realized the momentous import
of the situation, that the bulk of the Confederate army was in
such imminent peril that nothing could rescue it except a
counter-movement, quick, impetuous, and decisive. Lee resolved to save
it, and, if need be, to save it at the sacrifice of his own life. With
perfect self-poise, he rode to the margin of that breach, and
appeared upon the scene just as I had completed the alignment
of my troops and was in the act of moving in that crucial
countercharge upon which so much depended. As he rode
majestically in front of my line of battle, with uncovered head
and mounted on Old Traveller, Lee looked a very god of war.
Calmly and grandly, he rode to a point near the centre of my line
and turned his horse's head to the front, evidently resolved to
lead in person the desperate charge and drive Hancock back or
perish in the effort. I knew what he meant; and although the
passing moments were of priceless value, I resolved to arrest
him in his effort, and thus save to the Confederacy the life of its
great leader. I was at the centre of that line when General Lee
rode to it. With uncovered head, he turned his face toward
Hancock's advancing column. Instantly I spurred my horse
across Old Traveller's front, and grasping his bridle in my hand, I
checked him. Then, in a voice which I hoped might reach the
ears of my men and command their attention, I called out,
"General Lee, you shall not lead my men in a charge. No man
can do that, sir. Another is here for that purpose. These men
behind you are

Georgians, Virginians, and Carolinians. They have never failed
you on any field. They will not fail you here. Will you, boys?"
The response came like a mighty anthem that must have stirred
his emotions as no other music could have done. Although the
answer to those three words, "Will you, boys?" came in the
monosyllables, "No, no, no; we 'll not fail him," yet they were
doubtless to him more eloquent because of their simplicity and
momentous meaning. But his great heart was destined to be
quickly cheered by a still sublimer testimony of their deathless
devotion. As this first thrilling response died away, I uttered the
words for which they were now fully prepared. I shouted to
General Lee, "You must go to rear." The echo, "General Lee
to the rear, General Lee to the rear!" rolled back with
tremendous emphasis from the throats of my men; and they
gathered around him, turned his horse in the opposite direction,
some clutching his bridle, some his stirrups, while others pressed
close to Old Traveller's hips, ready to shove him by main force to
the rear. I verily believe that, had it been necessary or possible,
they would have carried on their shoulders both horse and rider
to a place of safety.

This entire scene, with all its details of wonderful pathos and
deep meaning, had lasted but a few minutes, and yet it was a
powerful factor in the rescue of Lee's army. It had lifted these
soldiers to the very highest plane of martial enthusiasm. The
presence of their idolized commander-in-chief, his purpose to
lead them in person, his magnetic and majestic presence, and the
spontaneous pledges which they had just made to him, all
conspired to fill them with an ardor and intensity of emotion such
as have rarely possessed a body of troops in any war. The most
commonplace soldier was uplifted and transformed into a
veritable Ajax. To say that every man in those brigades was
prepared for the most heroic work or

to meet a heroic death would be but a lame description of the
impulse which seemed to bear them forward in wildest
transport. Fully realizing the value of such inspiration for the
accomplishment of the bloody task assigned them, I turned to my
men as Lee was forced to the rear, and reminding them of their
pledges to him, and of the fact that the eyes of their great leader
were still upon them, I ordered, "Forward!" With the fury of a
cyclone, and almost with its resistless power, they rushed upon
Hancock's advancing column. With their first terrific onset, the
impetuosity of which was indescribable, his leading lines were
shivered and hurled back upon their stalwart supports. In the
inextricable confusion that followed, and before Hancock's lines
could be reformed, every officer on horseback in my division,
the brigade and regimental commanders, and my own superb
staff, were riding among the troops, shouting in unison:
"Forward, men, forward!" But the brave line officers on foot and
the enthused privates needed no additional spur to their already
rapt spirits. Onward they swept, pouring their rapid volleys into
Hancock's confused ranks, and swelling the deafening din of
battle with their piercing shouts. Like the débris in the track of a
storm, the dead and dying of both armies were left in the wake
of this Confederate charge. In the meantime the magnificent
troops of Ramseur and Rodes were rushing upon Hancock's
dissolving corps from another point, and Long's artillery and
other batteries were pouring a deadly fire into the broken
Federal ranks. Hancock was repulsed and driven out. Every foot
of the lost salient and earthworks was retaken, except that small
stretch which the Confederate line was too short to cover.

These glorious troops had redeemed the pledge which they
had sent ringing through the air, thrilling the spirit of Lee: "No,
we will not fail him." Grandly had they

redeemed it, and at fearful cost; but the living were happy, and I
verily believe that if the dead could have spoken, they, too,
would have assured him of their compensation in the rescue of
his army[.] Among the gallant men who gave up their lives here
was the accomplished and knightly Major Daniel Hale of
Maryland, who served upon General Early's staff[.] He was so
wrought up by the enthusiasm which fired the troops that he
insisted on accompanying me through the battle. Riding at my
side, and joining in the exultant shouts of the men over the wild
pursuit, he had passed unscathed through the heaviest fire; but
at the very climax of the victory he fell dead upon the
recaptured breastworks as we spurred our horses across them.1

If speculation be desired as to what would have been the
result of failure in that fearful assault upon Hancock, some other
pen must be invoked for the task. It is enough for me to repeat
in this connection that the two wings of Lee's army had been
completely and widely severed; that Hancock, who was justly
called "the Superb," and who was one of the boldest of fighters
and most accomplished of soldiers, was in that breach and
literally revelling in his victory, as evidenced by his

1 General A. L. Long, who served for a time on General Lee's staff as military
secretary, describes, in his "Memoirs of Lee," p. 338, the effort of the
commander-in-chief to lead my troops in the desperate charge, and says: "During
the hottest portion of this engagement, when the Federals were pouring through
the broken Confederate lines and disaster seemed imminent, General Lee rode
forward and took his position at the head of General Gordon's column, then
preparing to charge. Perceiving that it was his intention to lead the charge,
Gordon spurred hastily to his side, seized the reins of his horse, and excitedly
cried:'General Lee, this is no place for you . . . . . These are Virginians and
Georgians--men who have never failed, and they will not fail now. Will you,
boys?' " Then, giving the thrilling reply of the men, and describing my order
and appeal to them, General Long adds: "The charge that followed was fierce and
telling, and the Federals, who had entered the lines, were hurled back before
the resolute advance of Gordon's gallant men. The works were retaken, the
Confederate line again established, and an impending disaster converted into a
brilliant victory "

characteristic field despatch to General Grant: "I have
used up Johnson and am going into Early"; that through this fearful
breach Grant could quickly hurl the bulk of his army upon the
right and left flanks of Lee's wings, which were now cleft
asunder; and that Lee himself thought that the time had come, as
such times do come in the experience of all truly great leaders,
when the crisis demanded that the commander-in-chief should
in person lead the "forlorn hope."

Long afterward, when the last bitter trial at Appomattox
came, Lee's overburdened spirit recurred to that momentous
hour at Spottsylvania, and he lamented that he had not been
permitted to fall in that furious charge or in some subsequent
battle.

As above stated, there was a short stretch of the Confederate
works still left in dispute. All that portion to the right of the
salient, the salient itself over which Hancock had charged, and
where General Edward Johnson and his troops were captured,
and a portion of our works to the left of the salient, had been
retaken. There was not one Union soldier left with arms in his
hands inside of that great crescent. All had been repulsed and
driven out; but these daring men in blue still stood
against the outer slope of the short line of intrenchment which
had not been struck by the Confederate hurricane.

There on that short stretch of breastworks occurred the
unparalleled fighting of which I have made brief mention. The
questions have often been asked: Why did the commanders of
the two armies put forth such herculean efforts over so short a
line? In what respect was this small space of earthworks so
essential to either army as to justify the expenditure of tons of
lead and barrels of blood? I will endeavor to make clear the
answer to these very natural inquiries. That short reach of works
was an integral part of Lee's battle line. The Confederates held
the inside of it, the Federals the

outside. These high-spirited American foeman were standing against
the opposite slopes of the same works,
and so close together that they could almost thrust their bayonets
into one another's breasts. If Lee could drive Grant's men from
the outer slope his entire line would be completely reëstablished.
If Grant could drive the Confederates from the inner slope he
would hold a breach in their lines, narrow it is true, but still a
breach, through
which he might again force his way, riving Lee's army a second
time, as the rail-splitter's wedge rives the timber as it is driven
into the narrow crack. Therefore, the complete possession by
the Federals of that disputed section meant to Grant a coveted
opportunity. To Lee it meant a serious menace. Neither could
afford to surrender so important a point without a desperate struggle; and the
followers of both seemed intuitively to comprehend the situation,
and to be prepared for any exaction of blood or life which it
might make upon them.

Of that struggle at Spottsylvania I write as an eyewitness and
not from hearsay. It was a drama of three great acts. The first
act was Hancock's charge. The
second was the Confederate countercharge. The third and last
was the night-and-day wrestle of the giants on the same
breastworks. The whole of that long and gory drama upon
which the curtain rose in the morning mists of the 12th, and did
not fall for more than twenty hours, is as vivid and real to me
now as it was the day after it was enacted. Each act of it
differed from the preceding act in no respect except in shifting
the scene from one
bloody phase to another still more bloody, from its beginning with
Hancock's charge in the darkness to its ending twenty hours
later in the succeeding night, amidst the incessant flashes of the
battle-storm. Its second
act had been played under Lee's eye, and largely by that
splendid soldiery whom it was my fortune and pride to
command; but even that did not end their share of the

performance. As soon as it was ascertained that the
Confederate lines had been too short to stretch across the whole
of the wide-spreading crescent, and that the outer slope of a
portion of Lee's works was still held by Grant's stalwart fighters,
the third and last act of that memorable performance was
opened. Under ray orders, and under cover of the intrenchment,
my men began to slip to the left a few feet at a time, in order to
occupy, unobserved if possible, that still open space. The ditch
along which they slowly glided, and from which the earth had
been thrown to form the embankment, favored them; but
immediately opposite to them and within a few feet of them on
the outer side stood their keen-eyed, alert foemen, holding to
their positions with a relentless grip. This noiseless sliding
process had not proceeded far before it was discovered by the
watchful men in blue. The discovery was made at the moment
when Lee and Grant began to hurl their columns against that
portion of the works held by both. Thus was inaugurated that roll
of musketry which is likely to remain without a parallel, at least
in the length of time it lasted.

Mounting to the crest of the embankment, the Union men
poured upon the Confederates a galling fire. To the support of
the latter other Confederate commands quickly came, crowding
into the ditches, clambering up the embankment's side, and
returning volley for volley. Then followed the mighty rush from
both armies, filling the entire disputed space. Firing into one
another's faces, beating one another down with clubbed
muskets, the front ranks fought across the embankment's crest
almost within an arm's reach, the men behind passing up to them
freshly loaded rifles as their own were emptied. As those in
front fell, others quickly sprang forward to take their places. On
both sides the dead were piled in heaps. As Confederates fell
their bodies rolled into the ditch, and upon their bleeding
forms their living comrades

stood, beating back Grant's furiously charging columns.
The bullets seemed to fly in sheets. Before the pelting hail and
withering blast the standing timber fell. The breastworks were
literally drenched in blood. The coming of the darkness failed to
check the raging battle. It only served to increase the awful
terror of the scene.

As I now recall that scene, looking back to it over the
intervening years and with the calmer thought and clearer
perceptions that come in more advanced age, I am still more
deeply impressed with the conviction that, considered in all its
phases, this battle between Americans on the 12th of May and
the succeeding night at Spottsylvania has no parallel in the
annals of war. Considered merely in their sanguinary character,--
the number of lives lost, the area over which they extended,
and the panorama presented by vast armies manoeuvring, charging,
repelling, retreating, and reforming,--many of the battles of our
Civil War surpassed it. Among these were Chickamauga,
Gettysburg, Chancellorsville, Cold Harbor, the battles around
Atlanta, Fredericksburg, Sharpsburg, or Antietam, and perhaps
Shiloh and Franklin, Tennessee. But to Spottsylvania history will
accord the palm, I am sure, for having furnished an unexampled
muzzle-to-muzzle fire; the longest roll of incessant, unbroken
musketry; the most splendid exhibition of individual heroism and
personal daring by large numbers, who, standing in the freshly
spilt blood of their fellows, faced for so long a period and at so
short a range the flaming rifles as they heralded the decrees of
death.

This heroism was confined to neither side. It was exhibited by
both armies, and in that hand-to-hand struggle for the possession
of the breastworks it seemed almost universal. It would be a
commonplace truism to say that such examples will not be lost
to the Republic.

The thought has found its expression in a thousand
memorial addresses in every section of the Union; but in the
spectacle then, as in the contemplation now, there was much
that was harrowing as well as inspiring. The gifted Father Ryan,
Southern patriot and poet, writing of the South's sacrifices in
war, of her sufferings in final defeat, and of the record made by
her sons, said:

There's a glory in gloom, And a grandeur in graves.
And he wrote truly. The pathos of this wail, like that of the
Roman adage, "Dulce et decorum est pro patria, mori," or of
those still nobler words, "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of
the church," will impress every one who reads it and who
appreciates the grandeur of a man who is ready to die for his
convictions.1

1 As proof that the description I have given of the horrible scenes of the 12th
of May is not overdrawn, and that no language could exaggerate either the
heroism or the horrors of that battle, I give two extracts from Northern
writers. Swinton, in his "History of the Army of the Potomac," says: "Of all the
struggles of the war, this was perhaps the fiercest and most deadly." He then
describes the charges, and states that the fearful slaughter continued "till the
ground was literally covered with piles of the dead and the woods in front of
the salient were one hideous Golgotha."

General Horace Porter, of General Grant's staff, says: "The battle near,
the'Angle' was probably the most desperate engagement in modern
warfare . . . . . Rank after rank was riddled by shot and shell and bayonet
thrusts, and finally sank, a
mass of torn and mutilated corpses . . . . . Trees over a foot and a half in
diameter were cut completely in two by the incessant musketry fire . . . . . We
had not only
shot down an army, but also a forest . . . . . Skulls were crushed with clubbed
muskets, and men were stabbed to death with swords and bayonets thrust between
the logs of the parapet which separated the combatants . . . . . Even the
darkness . . . . . failed to stop the fierce contest, and the deadly strife did
not cease till after
midnight." General Porter then describes the scene which met him on his visit to
that Angle the next day, and says that the dead "were piled upon each other in
some places four layers deep . . . . . Below the mass of fast-decaying corpses,
the convulsive twitching of limbs and the writhing of bodies showed that there
were wounded men still alive and struggling to extricate themselves from their
horrid entombment."

CHAPTER XXI

MOVEMENTS AFTER SPOTTSYLVANIA

A surprising capture--Kind treatment received by prisoners--Five rainy
days of inaction--Fighting resumed on May 18--Hancock's corps ordered to
the assault--General Grant's order to Meade: "Where Lee goes, there you will
go also"--How Lee turned the tables--Fighting it out on this line all
summer--Lee's men still resolute after the Wilderness.

AS Hancock's troops were driven out of our lines on
the morning of the 12th, the commander of one of
my regiments, Colonel Davant of the Thirty-eighth
Georgia, became so enthused that he ran in pursuit
ahead of his men, and passed some distance beyond the
breastworks. A squad of Hancock's retreating men at
once halted, and, in the quaint phraseology of the army,
"quietly took him in." Davant, surprised to find himself
in the hands of Hancock's bluecoats instead of in
the company of his Confederate comrades, attempted
to give notice to his men in the rear that he was
captured. His adjutant, John Gordon Law, my first
cousin, heard the colonel's call, and sprang forward
through the thicket to aid him. Law was likewise captured,
and was kept in prison to the end of the war.
He is now a prominent minister of the Presbyterian
Church, and delights to tell of the great kindness
shown him by the guard to whose care he was assigned.
The soldier in blue who guarded Law was a private,
and had no possible use for a sword-belt; but he wanted
it, nevertheless. Instead of taking it forcibly, he paid

for it, in greenbacks, the full price named by Law. In answer to
Law's lament that he was going to prison without a change of
clothing or any blankets, this generous Union boy offered to sell
him his own blankets. Law replied to the suggestion:

"I have no money to pay you for your blankets, except
Confederate bills and the greenbacks which you have just paid
me for the sword-belt."

"Oh, well," said the Federal private, "you can pay me for the
blankets in Confederate money, and if I should be captured it
will answer my purpose. If I should not be captured I will not
need the money. Give me your'graybacks' and you keep my
'greenbacks' to help you along during your stay in Fort Warren."

The gallant General Edward Johnson of Virginia, who was
captured at the salient in Hancock's charge, heartily
reciprocated the cordial greetings of his West Point comrades
into whose hands he came as prisoner of war, and received
from them great consideration and soldierly courtesy. Such
courtesy and kind treatment were frequently shown by the
Confederates to captured Union officers and men, and it is a
special pleasure, therefore, to record these instances of the
same kindly spirit among the Federals.

The appalling night scenes of the 12th did not mark the end
of bloodshed at Spottsylvania, but only compelled a pause in the
sickening slaughter long enough to give the armies time to take
breath.

General Lee had failed to drive the Federals from the outer
slope of that short and disputed section of breastworks. General
Grant had failed to drive the Confederates from the inner slope
or to extend his possession of the works either to the right or to
the left. Another test, therefore, of the mettle of the two armies
was to be made on the same field. Five days passed, however,

before the Union chief clearly indicated to his antagonist his
next move.

The weather was doubtless largely responsible for the delay.
The continued rain had soaked the ground as well as the jackets
and blankets of the men. It was impracticable to move artillery
or wagon-trains; and while infantry could march and fight
without bogging in the soft earth, there was naturally less of the
fighting tendency under such conditions. Soldiers, in a certain
sense, are machines; but they are impressible, sentient
machines. With clothing drenched, gun-barrels wet, fingers
benumbed, and bodies cold, the flaming enthusiasm requisite for
the charge was somewhat dormant.

May 17th was a brighter day. The rain had ceased and the
sun and brisk winds had dried the clothing of the men, and their
spirits responded to the aspect of the bright spring morning.

General Grant decided to make another desperate attempt to
drive Lee from his position at Spottsylvania. On the morning of
the 18th he sent Hancock's corps, reënforced by fully 8000 fresh
troops, with Wright's corps to aid him, back to the point where
the assault of May 12th had been made. Hancock had already
twice passed over this "Bloody Angle," once in his successful
advance and again upon his repulse by the Confederate
countercharge. He was now to pass the third time over "Hell's
Half Acre," another name by which this gory angle was known.
In this last effort he was, however, to have the coöperation of
that excellent corps commander, General Wright. The attack
was to be made by daylight, and not in the darkness or under
cloudy cover, as on the morning of the 12th, and not upon the
same breastworks, but upon new Confederate intrenchments
which had been constructed behind them. General Grant was to
superintend the daring movement in person.

In superb style and evidently with high hopes, the Union army
moved to the assault. The Confederates, although their numbers
had been materially decreased by the casualties of battle and
withdrawals from this left wing to strengthen our right, were
ready for them; and as Hancock's and Wright's brave men
climbed over the old abandoned works and debouched from the
intervening bushes, a consuming fire of grape, canister, and
Minié balls was poured in incessant volleys upon them. Such a
fire was too much for any troops. They first halted before it, and
staggered. Then they rallied, moved forward, halted again,
wavered, bent into irregular zigzag lines, and at last broke in
confusion and precipitate retreat. Again and again they renewed
the charge, but each assault ended, as the first, in repulse and
heavy slaughter.

Thus ended the second series of battles in which the Union
commander had failed to drive the Confederate forces from the
field. In both Lee had successfully repelled Grant's assaults--first
in the Wilderness and now at Spottsylvania--and compelled
him to seek other points at which to repeat his efforts.

In speaking of the plans marked out by his chief before the
opening of the campaign of 1864, General Porter says: "It was
the understanding that Lee's army was to be the objective point
of the Army of the Potomac, and it was to move against
Richmond only in case Lee went there." General Porter further
adds that General Grant's own words to Meade were, "Where
Lee goes, there you will go also." And yet on the failure of these
last desperate assaults upon Lee at Spottsylvania, General
Porter represents his chief as writing "an order providing for a
general movement by the left, flank toward Richmond, to begin
the next night."

that this order of May 18th is hardly consistent with his
previously announced plans of looking for Lee's army, and for
nothing else, nor with his instructions to Meade: "Where Lee
goes, there you will go also." Lee was not going toward
Richmond except as Grant went toward Richmond. He was not
going in any direction. He was standing still at Spottsylvania and
awaiting the pleasure of General Grant. He had been there for
about ten days, and was showing no disposition whatever to run
away. There was no difficulty in finding him, and it was not
necessary for General Meade to go to the North Anna or
toward Richmond to find Lee in order to obey intelligently the
instructions, "there you will go also."

General Lee first went into the Wilderness because General
Grant had gone there, and Lee did not "get out of the
Wilderness" until his antagonist had gone out and moved to
another place. Lee moved to Spottsylvania because the Union
commander was moving there; and any movement of General
Meade away from Spottsylvania would be going where Lee was
not. He was not on the Rappahannock, where the Union
commander proposed to make his base; he was not retreating,
he was not hiding. He was close by on the field which had been
selected by his able antagonist, and was ready for a renewal of
the struggle.

Verily it would seem that Grant's martial shibboleth, "Where
Lee goes, there you will go also," had been reversed; for, in
literal truth, Meade was not going where Lee went, but Lee was
going where Meade went. It was General Grant's intention that
General Lee should learn from every Union cannon's brazen
throat, from every hot muzzle of every Union rifle, that nothing
could prevent the Army of the Potomac from following him until
the Confederate hosts were swept from the overland highways
to Richmond. The impartial verdict of

history, however, and the testimony of every bloody field on
which these great American armies met in this overland
campaign, from the Wilderness to the water route and to the
south side of the James, must necessarily be that the going
where the other goes was more literally the work of Lee than of
Grant.

On May 11, 1864, at Spottsylvania, that remarkable letter was
written to General Halleck by General Grant in which he used
those words which became at once famous: "I propose to fight it
out on this line if it takes all summer." This declaration by the
illustrious commander of the Union army evidenced that
wonderful tenacity of purpose upon which General Lee had
commented previously on the morning of the 7th in the
Wilderness.

General Grant was not quite explicit as to what he meant by
"this line." If he meant the overland route to Richmond which
McDowell and Pope and Burnside and Hooker had each
essayed and on which each had failed, as distinguished from the
water route by the James River, which McClellan had
attempted, General Grant found reasons to change his mind
before the summer was ended. He did not "fight it out on this
line"; for, long before the "all summer" limit which he had set
was reached, the Union army found itself on an entirely different
line--the James River or McClellan line. It will be noted that this
celebrated letter of General Grant was written prior to the
twenty hours of death-struggle on the 12th of May. Had he
waited forty-eight hours, that letter probably never would have
been penned.

Martin Luther once said: "Great soldiers make not many
words, but when they speak the deed is done." General Grant
measured up to Martin Luther's standard. He was a soldier of
prompt and resolute action and of few words; but the few
words he did speak in

that letter to General Halleck would now seem to indicate that
he overestimated the value of numbers and underestimated the
steadfastness of the small army that opposed him. He was led to
say to General Halleck in that same letter: "I am satisfied that
the enemy are very shaky, and are only kept up to the mark by
the greatest exertion on the part of their officers." This opinion
of the morale of Lee's army General Grant had abundant
reasons to change, as he did to change his determination to
"fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." The simple truth
is, as General Grant afterward must have learned, there was no
period of the war, since the day on which Lee assumed the
command, when his army as a whole was less "shaky," more
steadfast, more self-reliant, more devoted to its great leader and
to the Southern cause. There was no period when that army
more constantly exhibited "a spirit yet unquelled and high" than
during the fearful experiences of 1864.

Fragments of broken iron are welded closest and strongest in
the hottest fires. So the shattered corps of Lee's army seemed to
be welded together by Grant's hammering--by the blood and the
sweat and the fury of the flames that swept over and around
them. In the tangled jungles of the Wilderness; through the
incessant uproar by day and night at Spottsylvania; on the
reddened banks of the North Anna; amidst the sickening
slaughter of Cold Harbor,--everywhere, and on every field where
the American armies met in deadly grapple, whether behind
breastworks or in the open, whether assaulting or repelling,
whether broken by the resistless impact or beating back with
clubbed muskets the headlong charges of Grant,--these worn
and battered soldiers of Lee seemed determined to compensate
him for his paucity of numbers by a self-immolation and a
steadfast valor never surpassed, if ever equalled.

This estimate of the marvellous courage displayed by Lee's
men will not be regarded as too partial when the salient facts
of this campaign are recalled.

I might safely rest the overwhelming vindication of these
Southern soldiers against the statement of General Grant that
they were "shaky" on the single and signal fact that, from the
Wilderness to Cold Harbor inclusive, in the brief space of
twenty-eight days, they had placed hors du combat about as many
men as Lee commanded, killing, wounding, or capturing one of
Grant's men for every Confederate in Lee's army. Or, to state
the fact in different form, had General Grant inflicted equal
damage upon Lee's troops, the last Confederate of that army
would have been killed, wounded, or captured, still leaving
General Grant with an army very much larger than any force
that had been under Lee's command at any period of the
campaign.

Of course this wonderful disparity of relative losses is due in a
measure to the fact that the Confederate army acted generally
upon the defensive, on shorter lines, and behind intrenchments.
This, however, was not always true. In the two days of terrific
combat in the Wilderness, neither side was protected by
breastworks, except those hastily constructed by both sides as
the men were halted in line of battle. Both sides were engaged
in assaulting and repelling. The lines of both were repeatedly
broken by furious charges and countercharges. But Lee's army
remained upon the field until its great antagonist had selected
another field of conflict.

At Spottsylvania also the armies at first met and wrestled
upon exactly equal footing, as far as breastworks were
concerned; and when, finally, Lee's rude intrenchments were
hastily thrown up, they were thrice carried by Grant's
determined assault, by the resistless momentum of his
concentrated columns, and carried under such conditions as
would have imperilled the

safety, if not the very existence, of an ordinary army--conditions
which would assuredly have filled Lee's soldiers with panic, had
they been in any sense "shaky," as General Grant supposed
them to be.

At the very moment when the Union commander was penning
that letter to General Halleck, there must have been sounding in
his ears the ominous notes of Hancock's preparations for the
momentous movement to occur the next morning, before the
dawn of the 12th of May. I repeat that had General Grant waited
a few hours he would have found a word of exactly opposite
import to convey to General Halleck his impression as to the
morale of Lee's army. He would have found the attenuated line
of my troops thrown quickly and defiantly across Hancock's
formidable front. He would have found these Confederates
standing calmly in the open field, waiting the command to rush
upon Hancock's advancing legions, and filled with more anxiety
for Lee's safety than for their own, thus exhibiting that true
intrepidity which is begotten only in bravest breasts amid greatest
perils. He would have seen these Confederates in the next
moment, uplifted and inspired by Lee's presence, rushing upon
Hancock's advancing column, and hurling it back in the wildest
confusion. General Grant was too thoughtful, too great a soldier,
to misinterpret this sudden transition of his army from exultant
victory to depressing defeat. He was too experienced a warrior
to call an army "shaky" when one of its thin lines of battle with
no supports could hurl itself without hesitation, without a tremor,
in a whirlwind of enthusiasm, against tenfold its number. Had
that letter to General Halleck been delayed until he decided to
withdraw from Spottsylvania, from the Pamunkey, from the
North Anna, and from Cold Harbor, where many thousands of
his brave men lay breathless and cold, he would more probably
have told General Halleck that he would not "fight it out on

this line," because the enemy seemed to gather additional hope
and confidence and courage on every field of conflict.

Bourrienne, who served with Napoleon as private secretary,
represents the Austrian general, who had been hammered and
baffled at every turn by the great Frenchman, as supremely
disgusted with the Napoleonic style of fighting. He regarded the
little Corsican as an untrained boy, a more tyro in the art of war,
violating all its recognized rules, turning up with his army at the
oddest places, now on the Austrian flank, now in the rear and
then in front, observing none of the established laws of tactics
or strategy, but unceremoniously knocking the Austrians to
pieces in a manner that was truly shocking to all scientific ideas
of campaigning.

I do not pretend to give Bourrienne's words, but the above is a
fair though somewhat liberal interpretation of his statement. It is
not possible to rely upon any representations made by
Bourrienne, for his character did not command the confidence
and respect of honorable men. If he had lived in the Southern
States of America after the war and during the period of
reconstruction, he would have been designated, in the
picturesque slang of the period, as a "scalawag"; for he not only
deserted Napoleon in his final defeat and deepest woe, but
joined his enemies, took office from the victors, perverted his
public trust to private gain, and ended his career dishonored in
the estimation of all true men. But, whatever may be said of
Bourrienne's statement, it is certain that Napoleon's methods
furnished frequent surprises to the commanders of opposing
armies. And the unbiassed historian, in reviewing and analyzing
the moves made by Grant on the vast chess-board reaching
from the Wilderness to Petersburg, and the partial checkmates
made by Lee in every game, will be forced to the conclusion that
Lee's ubiquity must have been as

great a marvel to Grant as Napoleon's was to the astounded
Austrian. On May 5th Grant hurried his magnificent army,
unmolested by even a picket shot, across the Rapidan to turn
Lee's right; but the great leader of the Union forces found his
wily antagonist not only checking him in the Wilderness, but on
the next day (the 6th) turning the Union right flank and sweeping
with the destructive energy of a whirlwind to the Union rear.

Protected from observation by the density of the forest,
Grant withdrew his bleeding army, and, under the cover of
night, pressed with all possible speed to Spottsylvania; but there
again he found Lee's vanguard across the line of his march,
disputing his further advance. Again, after more than ten days of
fighting and manoeuvring, of alternate successes and reverses,
of desperate charges and deadly repulses, capturing breastworks
only to see them recaptured, General Grant inaugurated the third
and fourth and subsequent swiftly recurring movements, seeking
by forced marches to plant his army in advantageous fields on
Lee's right,
only to find the Southern leader in possession of the coveted
stronghold and successfully resisting all efforts to dislodge him.
As Lee divined Grant's movement to Spottsylvania almost at the
very instant the movement was taking shape in Grant's brain, so
on each succeeding field he read the mind of the Union
commander, and
developed his own plans accordingly. There was no mental
telepathy in all this. Lee's native and tutored genius enabled him
to place himself in Grant's position, to reason out his antagonist's
mental processes, to trace
with accuracy the lines of his marches, and to mark on the map
the points of future conflict which were to
become the blood-lettered mile-posts marking Grant's
compulsory halts and turnings in his zigzag route to Richmond.
Finally, at Cold Harbor, where a supreme

effort was made to rip open Lee's lines by driving through them
the stiff and compact Union columns, and where the
slaughtered Federals presented the ghastliest scene ever
witnessed on any field of the war, General Grant decided
promptly and wisely to abandon further efforts on the north side
and cross to the south side of the James River.

After this sanguinary repulse of the Union forces at Cold
Harbor, a report gained circulation, and was generally credited,
that General Grant's troops refused to obey the orders of their
officers to advance in another assault. This statement, which it
was difficult for me to believe at the time, has found a place in
several books, written by both Northern and Southern authors. I
am glad to find this grave injustice to the brave men of the
Union army corrected by General Porter in his "Campaigning
with Grant." Shocking as had been the slaughter of Union
troops in their last charges, costly and hopeless as succeeding
assaults must have appeared to the practised eye and sharpened
comprehension of Grant's veterans, they still seemed ready for
the sacrifice if demanded by necessity or ordered by the
commanding general. As a Confederate who had occasion to
observe the conduct of these men on many fields, I am glad that
General Porter has given to posterity his own witness of a
pathetic scene which eloquently refutes the slander of these
brave men in blue. With the "appalling revelry" of the last futile
onsets still ringing in their ears, with the unburied bodies of their
dead comrades lying in full view on the blood-stained stretch of
wooded swamp and plain at Cold Harbor, these self-immolating
men were calmly and courageously preparing for the next
charge and sacrifice. According to General Porter, who was in
a position to know whereof he affirms, there was not the
slightest indication of rebellion or defiance of orders, not a trace

of stubbornness or sullenness in the bearing of these battered
Federals; but they were quietly sewing to their jackets strips of
cloth marked with their names, in order that their dead bodies
might be identified the next day amidst the prospective débris of
the coming storm. It gives me genuine pleasure to aid as far as I
can in correcting the wrong which this ill-founded report has
done to these high-spirited Americans.

CHAPTER XXII

HUNTER'S RAID AND EARLY'S CHASE

The movement upon Lynchburg--Hunter's sudden panic--Devastation in the
Valley--Burning of private homes--Lee's orders against destruction of
private property--Washington threatened--The battle of Monocacy--A
brave charge--The defeat of General Lew Wallace.

AS the Union army prepared to cross the James, with the
purpose of surprising the small Confederate force at Petersburg
and capturing the city, my command under General Early began,
on June 13, 1864, the movement to check Hunter's raid upon
Lynchburg. By rapid marching, and by seizing all railroad trains,
passenger and freight, and loading the men into box and stock
cars, Early's little army reached Lynchburg very soon after
General Hunter's Union forces occupied the adjacent hills. There
was no fighting of consequence at Lynchburg; and it was then
and still is incomprehensible to me that the small force under
Early seemed to have filled Hunter with sudden panic. His
hurried exit from Lynchburg was in marked contrast with his
confident advance upon it, and suggests an improvement in the
adage:

He who fights and runs away Will live to fight another day;
for he ran away without any fight at all--at least, without any
demonstration that could be called a fight. He

not only fled without a test of relative strength, but fled
precipitately, and did not stop until he had found a safe retreat
beyond the mountains toward the Ohio.

If I were asked for an opinion as to this utterly causeless
fright and flight, I should be tempted to say that conscience, the
inward monitor which "makes cowards of us all," was harrowing
General Hunter, and causing him to see an avenger wrapped in
every gray jacket before him. He was not a Virginian; but his
Virginia kinsmen almost to a man were enlisted in the struggle
for Southern independence. One of his relatives, Major Robert
W. Hunter, was a member of my staff. Another, the Hon. R. M.
T. Hunter, was Confederate Secretary of State. In the Valley of
Virginia dwelt many of his kindred, who were often made to feel
the sting of his military power. Had he been a Virginian,
however, his support of the Union cause would have engendered
no bitterness toward him if he had worn his uniform worthily,
remembering that he was an American soldier, bearing a high
commission from the foremost and freest Republic of earth.
General Lee's own sister was a Union woman, the wife of a
Union officer; but that fact did not deprive her of the
affectionate interest of her family, nor of the chivalric regard of
Southern soldiers. It did not obliterate or apparently lessen in any
degree her devotion to her brother, Robert E. Lee, nor her
appreciation of him as a great soldier. In expressing her loyalty
to her husband and the Union cause, and her hope for the
triumph of the Federal armies, she would usually add a doubt as
to their ability to "whip Robert." General Thomas, one of the
ablest commanders of the Union forces, was a Virginian, but he
did not apply the torch to private homes or order the burning of
his kindred's barns. Hence the esteem with which he will always
be regarded by the Southern people.

or he would not have been intrusted with the grave
responsibilities which attach to the commander of a department;
but it is hard to trace any evidences of knighthood in the wreck
and ravage which marked the lines of his marches. He ordered
the destruction of the Virginia Military Institute, one of the most
important educational institutions in the State. It will be difficult
to find any rule of civilized warfare or any plea of necessity
which could justify General Hunter in the burning of these
buildings. He could scarcely plead as an excuse the fact that the
boys of this school had marched down the Valley in a body,
joined General Breckinridge, and aided materially in the brilliant
victory at New Market over his predecessor, General Sigel.
Upon any such ground the destruction of every university,
college, and common school in the South could have been
justified; for all of them were converting their pupils into soldiers.
My youngest brother ran away from school before he was
fifteen years old as captain of a company of schoolboys of his
own age and younger, who reported in a body to General Joseph
E. Johnston at Dalton for service. They were too young for
soldiers, and General Johnston declined to accept them for any
service except that of guarding a bridge across the
Chattahoochee River, which they defended in gallant style. The
Southern armies contained a very much larger proportion of boys
under proper age than the Union armies, but there were notable
instances of young Northern boys who demanded places in the
fighting-line. General Grant's own son, now Brigadier-General
Frederick D. Grant of the United States army, whose courtesy
and consideration have won for him the esteem and friendship of
the Southern people, wore a blue uniform and was under fire
before he was fifteen.

General Hunter's campaign of destruction did not end with the
burning of the Virginia Military Institute.

The homes of Governor Letcher, of the Hon. Andrew Hunter,
of Charles James Faulkner, whose wife was Hunter's relative;
of Edmund Lee (a first cousin of General Lee), and of
Alexander B. Boteler, were burned, with their entire contents;
and only time enough was given the women and children to
escape with their lives. Many other peaceful homes were
burned under orders. Had General Hunter been captured at this
time it would doubtless have been difficult to save him from the
vengeance of the troops.

General Edward Johnson, who was captured by Hancock in
his brilliant charge at Spottsylvania (May 12th), and who knew
General Hunter well in other days, described him as a noted
duelist in early life, who had killed two of his brother officers in
such combats. It was said that Jefferson Davis, who was at
West Point with Hunter, consented to act as second in one of
these duels. When the war was over, General Hunter made
repeated but unavailing advances for reconciliation with his
Southern relatives, among whom were some of the best families
in Virginia.

There was so much that was commendable, so much that
was truly chivalrous, in both Union and Confederate armies, that
I would gladly fill this book only with incidents illustrative of that
phase of the war. It is impossible, however, to write truthfully of
the campaigns of 1864 in the Valley of Virginia without some
allusion to those officers who left behind them the wide stretch
of desolation through which we were called to pass.

The official announcement of General Philip Sheridan, who
was regarded, I believe, as the ablest cavalry leader of the
Union army, that he had "destroyed over two thousand barns
filled with wheat and hay and farming implements; over seventy
mills filled with flour and wheat," etc., and that "the destruction
embraces Luray valley, Little Fort valley, as well as the main
valley,"

will give some conception of the indescribable suffering which the
women and children of that beautiful region were made to
endure. General Sheridan, as far as could be ascertained, did not
imitate the example of General Hunter in burning private homes;
but homes without the means of support were no longer homes.
With barns and mills and implements for tilling the soil all gone,
with cattle, sheep, and every animal that furnished food to the
helpless inmates carried off, they were dismal abodes of hunger,
of hopelessness, and of almost measureless woe.

It is to be hoped that official records will show that this mode
of warfare was not ordered by the authorities at Washington. It
is impossible to believe that it could have been approved by
President Lincoln, whose entire life, whose every characteristic,
was a protest against needless oppression and cruelty.

If General Sheridan was acting at that time under the orders
of the Union commander-in-chief, I am constrained to believe
that he interpreted his instructions with great laxity. I recall no
act of General Grant in the immediate conduct of his campaigns
that would indicate his disposition to bring upon any people such
sweeping desolation. Nor can I recall any speech of his that can
fairly be interpreted as expressing sympathy with General
Sherman in his declaration, "War is hell," or with Sherman's
purpose to make it hell. General Grant's fame as a commander
of armies in an enemy's country will, in the sober estimation of
posterity, be the more lasting because of the fact that his blows
fell upon armed soldiery, and not upon defenceless private
citizens. Unless his instructions to Sheridan were specific, he
cannot be held responsible for the torch that was applied to
almost every kind of private property in the Virginia valleys. It
would be almost as just to charge General Lee with responsibility
for the burning of Chambersburg in

the Cumberland Valley of Pennsylvania. This act of his
subordinate was a great shock to General Lee's sensibilities.
Although the destruction of Chambersburg was wholly in the
nature of reprisal for the wholesale destruction of the Virginia
valleys and the burning of Southern cities, yet it was so directly in
contravention of General Lee's orders, and so abhorrent to the
ideas and maxims with which he imbued his army, that a
high-spirited Virginia soldier flatly refused to obey the order when
directed by his superior officer to apply the torch to the city. That
soldier, whose disobedience was prompted by the highest dictates
of humanity, deserves a place of honor in history. He was not
only a man of iron resolution and imperturbable courage, who
fought from April, 1861, to April, 1865, and was repeatedly
wounded in battle, but he was a fit representative of that noblest
type of soldier who will inflict every legitimate damage on the
enemy in arms against his people, but who scorns, even as a
retaliatory measure, to wage war upon defenceless citizens and
upon women and children. This knightly Southern soldier was
Colonel William E. Peters of the Twenty-first Virginia Cavalry,
who has for forty-six years been a professor in the University of
Virginia and at Emory and Henry College. He obeyed the order to
move into Chambersburg with his troops and occupy the town, as
he was not apprised of the purpose of its occupancy; but when
the next order reached him to move his men to the court-house,
arm them with torches, and fire the town, his spirit rose in
righteous revolt. He calmly but resolutely refused obedience,
preferring to risk any consequences that disobedience might
involve, rather than be instrumental in devoting defenceless
inhabitants to so dire a fate. If all the officers who commanded
troops in that war, in which Americans fought one another so
fiercely and yet so grandly, had possessed the chivalry of Colonel
Peters, the history of the conflict

would not have been blurred and blackened by such ugly
records of widespread and pitiless desolation. Colonel Peters
was promptly placed under arrest for disobedience to orders;
but, prudently and wisely, he was never brought to trial.

A number of Federal generals led armies through different
portions of the South without leaving behind them any lasting
marks of reckless waste. In all of General Grant's triumphant
marches I do not believe he ever directly ordered or willingly
permitted the burning of a single home. And of his illustrious
opponent, General Robert E. Lee, I am impelled to say in this
connection that of the world's great chieftains who have led
armies into an enemy's territory, not one has left a nobler
example to posterity in his dealings with non-combatants and in
the protection which he afforded to private property. When the
Confederates crossed the Potomac into Maryland in 1862, he
issued the most stringent orders against all plundering and all
straggling through the country. On one of his rides in rear of his
lines he chanced to find one of Jackson's men with a stolen pig.
This evidence of disregard of the explicit orders against pilfering
so enraged General Lee that he ordered the soldier to be
delivered to General Jackson and executed; but as Jackson was
at the moment advancing in an attack, he directed that the soldier
be placed in the front rank of his column, in order that he might
be despatched by a Union rather than a Confederate bullet. The
culprit went through the fire, however, unscathed, and purchased
redemption from the death penalty by his conspicuous courage.
The representatives of foreign governments who visited General
Lee and accompanied him for a time on his campaigns were
impressed by the manifestations of his solicitude for the
protection of private citizens and private property in the enemy's
territory; and Colonel Freemantle

of the English army, who accompanied General Lee in his
invasion of Pennsylvania, has given to the world his testimony to
the effect that there was no straggling into private homes, "nor
were the inhabitants disturbed or annoyed by the soldiers." He
adds that, in view of the ravages which he saw in the Valley of
Virginia, "this forbearance was most commendable and
surprising."

"This forbearance," which I think posterity will unite in
pronouncing "most commendable," was also a worthy
response by the Confederate army to the wishes and explicit
orders of its idolized commander. No comment that can be
made, no eulogy that can ever be
pronounced upon General Lee, can equal the force and
earnestness of his own words embodied in his general order,
issued at Chambersburg as his hitherto victorious army was just
beginning its invasion of Pennsylvania.
The order is here given in full. It was a source of special and
poignant pain to General Lee that the very town in which this
order was penned and issued should become, at a later period,
the scene of retaliatory action. In the interest of civilized and
Christian warfare, and as an inspiration to American soldiers in
all the future, these words of Lee ought to be printed and
preserved in letters of gold:

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA.
CHAMBERSBURG, PA., June 27, 1863.

General Order No. 73.

The commanding general has observed with marked
satisfaction the conduct of the troops on the march, and
confidently anticipates results commensurate with the high spirit
they have manifested. No troops could have displayed greater
fortitude or better performed the arduous marches of the past
ten days. Their conduct in other respects has, with few
exceptions, been in keeping with their character as soldiers and
entitles them to approbation and praise.

part of some that they have in keeping the yet unsullied reputation of
the army, and that the duties exacted of us by civilization and
Christianity are not less obligatory in the country of the enemy than in
our own. The commanding general considers that no greater disgrace
could befall the army, and through it our whole people, than the
perpetration of the barbarous outrages upon the innocent and
defenseless and the wanton destruction of private property that have
marked the course of the enemy in our own country. Such proceedings
not only disgrace the perpetrators and all connected with them, but are
subversive of the discipline and efficiency of the army and destructive
of the ends of our present movements. It must be remembered that we
make war only on armed men, and that we cannot take vengeance for
the wrongs our people have suffered without lowering ourselves in the
eyes of all whose abhorrence has been excited by the atrocities of our
enemy, and offending against Him to whom vengeance belongeth,
without whose favor and support our efforts must all prove in vain.

The commanding general, therefore, earnestly exhorts the troops to
abstain with most scrupulous care from unnecessary or wanton injury
to private property, and he enjoins upon all officers to arrest and bring
to summary punishment all who shall in any way offend against the
orders on this subject.

R. E. LEE, General.

Among the great warriors who gave special lustre to Roman
arms, no one of them left a reputation more to be coveted by the
true soldier than Scipio Africanus. In native gifts and brilliancy of
achievements, he was perhaps the equal of Julius Caesar; while
in the nobler attributes of manly courtesy to womanhood, of
magnanimity to the defenceless who became subjects of his
military power, in self-abnegation and faithful adherence to
constitution and laws, he surpasses, I think, any warrior of his
time.

Lee exhibited everywhere all those lofty characteristics
which have made the name of Scipio immortal. He not only
possessed true genius,--the "gift that

Heaven gives and which buys a place next to a king,"--he had
what was better than genius--a heart whose every throb was in
harmony with the teachings of the Great Captain whom he
served. He had a spirit naturally robust and aggressive, but he
made it loyally obedient to the precepts of the Divine Master. In
the combination of great qualities, he will be adjudged in history
as measuring up as few commanders have ever done to Scipio's
lofty conception of the noblest soldier: the commander who could
win victories, but who found more pleasure in the protection
afforded defenceless citizens than in the disasters inflicted upon
armed enemies.

As the last of Hunter's men, who were worthy of a nobler
leader, filed through the mountain passes in their westward
flight, and the Southern troops in tattered gray were seen coming
down the valley pikes, the relief felt by that suffering people was
apparent on every hand. From every home on the pike along
which Hunter had marched came a fervid welcome.

With the hope of creating some apprehension for the safety of
the national capital and thus inducing General Grant to slacken
his hold on the Confederacy's throat, it was decided that we
should again cross the Potomac and threaten Washington. The
Federal authorities sent the dashing soldier, General Lew
Wallace,--who afterward became famous as the author of "Ben
Hur,"--to meet us with his army at Monocacy River, near
Frederick City, Maryland. His business was to check the rash
Southern invaders, and, if possible, to drive them back across the
Potomac.

The battle of Monocacy which ensued was short, decisive,
and bloody. While the two armies, under the command
respectively of Lew Wallace and Jubal Early, were
contemplating each other from the opposite banks, my division
was selected, not to prevent Wallace from

driving us out of Maryland, but to drive him from our front and
thus reopen the highway for our march upon the capital. My
movement was down the right bank of the Monocacy to a
fording-place below, the object being to cross the river and then
turn upon the Federal stronghold. My hope and effort were to
conceal the movement from Wallace's watchful eye until my
troops were over, and then apprise him of my presence on his
side of the river by a sudden rush upon his left flank; but
General McCausland's brigade of Confederate cavalry had
already gallantly attacked a portion of his troops, and he
discovered the manoeuvre of my division before it could drag
itself through the water and up the Monocacy's muddy and
slippery banks. He at once changed front and drew up his lines
in strong position to meet the assault.

This movement presented new difficulties. Instead of realizing
my hope of finding the Union forces still facing Early's other
divisions beyond the river, giving my isolated command the
immense advantage of the proposed flank attack, I found myself
separated from all other Confederate infantry, with the bristling
front of Wallace's army before me. In addition to this trouble, I
found difficulties before unknown which strongly militated
against the probable success of my movement. Across the
intervening fields through which we were to advance there were
strong farm fences, which my men must climb while under fire.
Worse still, those fields were thickly studded with huge
grain-stacks which the harvesters had recently piled. They were so
broad and high and close together that no line of battle could
possibly be maintained while advancing through them. Every
intelligent private in my command, as he looked over the field,
must have known before we started that my battle-line would
become tangled and confused in the attempt to charge through
these obstructions.

With an able commander in my front, and his compact ranks
so placed as to rake every foot of the field with their fire, with
the certainty of having my lines broken and tangled by fences
and grain-stacks at every rod of advance, it is not difficult to
understand the responsibility of hazarding battle without
supporting Confederate infantry in reach. The nerve of the
best-trained and bravest troops is sorely taxed, even under most
favorable conditions, when assaulting an enemy well posted, and
pouring an incessant well-directed fire into their advancing
ranks. To how much severer test of nerve were my troops to be
subjected in this attempt to charge where the conditions forced
them while under fire to break into column, halt and reform, and
make another start, only to be broken again by the immovable
stacks all over the field! I knew, however, that if any troops in
the world could win victory against such adverse conditions,
those high-mettled Southern boys would achieve it there.

En échelon by brigades from the right the movement began.
As we reached the first line of strong and high fencing, and my
men began to climb over it, they were met by a tempest of
bullets, and many of the brave fellows fell at the first volley. But
over they climbed or tumbled, and rushed forward, some of them
halting to break down gaps in the fence, so that the mounted
officers might ride through. Then came the grain-stacks. Around
them and between them they pressed on, with no possibility of
maintaining orderly alignment or of returning any effective fire.
Deadly missiles from Wallace's ranks were cutting down the line
and company officers with their words of cheer to the men but
half spoken. It was one of those fights where success depends
largely upon the prowess of the individual soldier. The men were
deprived of that support and strength imparted by a compact line,
where the elbow touch of

comrade with comrade gives confidence to each and sends the
electric thrill of enthusiasm through all. But nothing could deter
them. Neither the obstructions nor the leaden blast in their front
could check them. The supreme test of their marvellous nerve
and self-control now came. They had passed the forest of
malign wheatstacks; they had climbed the second fence and
were in close proximity to Wallace's first line of battle, which
stood firmly and was little hurt. The remaining officers, on
horseback and on foot, rapidly adjusted their commands, and I
ordered "Forward!" and forward they went. I recall no charge
of the war, except that of the 12th of May against Hancock, in
which my brave fellows seemed so swayed by an enthusiasm
which amounted almost to a martial delirium; and the swell of
the Southern yell rose high above the din of battle as they
rushed upon the resolute Federals and hurled them back upon
the second line.

The Union lines stood firmly in this second position, bravely
defending the railroad and the highway to Washington. Between
the two hostile lines there was a narrow ravine down which ran
a small stream of limpid water. In this ravine the fighting was
desperate and at close quarters. To and fro the battle swayed
across the little stream, the dead and wounded of both sides
mingling their blood in its waters; and when the struggle was
ended a crimsoned current ran toward the river. Nearly one half
of my men and large numbers of the Federals fell there. Many of
my officers went down, and General Clement A. Evans, the
trusted leader of my largest brigade, was severely wounded. A
Minié ball struck him in his left side, passing through a pocket of
his coat, and carrying with it a number of pins, which were so
deeply embedded that they were not all extracted for a number
of years. But the execution of his orders was superintended by
his staff officer,

In that vortex of fire my favorite battle-horse, presented to me
by my generous comrades, which had never hitherto been
wounded, was struck by a Minié ball, and plunged and fell in the
midst of my men, carrying me down with him. Ordinarily the
killing of a horse in battle, though ridden by the commander,
would scarcely be worth noting; but in this case it was serious.
By his death I had been unhorsed in the very crisis of the battle.
Many of my leading officers were killed or disabled. The
chances for victory or defeat were at the moment so evenly
balanced that a temporary halt or slight blunder might turn the
scales. My staff were bearing orders to different portions of the
field. But some thoughtful officer sent me a horse and I was
again mounted.

Wallace's army, after the most stubborn resistance and heavy
loss, was driven from railroad and pike in the direction of
Baltimore. The Confederate victory was won at fearful cost and
by practically a single division, but it was complete, and the way
to Washington was opened for General Early's march.

CHAPTER XXIII

WINCHESTER AND PRECEDING EVENTS

The Confederate army within sight of Washington--The city could have been
taken--Reasons for the retreat--Abandonment of plan to release Confederate
prisoners--The Winchester campaign--Assault on Sheridan's front--Sudden
rally--Retreat of Early's army--The battle of Fisher's Hill.

ON July 11, 1864, the second day after the battle of Monocacy,
we were at the defences of Washington. We were nearer to the
national capital than any armed Confederates had ever been, and
nearer to it than any Federal army had ever approached to
Richmond. It has been claimed that at the time we reached
these outer works they were fully manned by troops. This is a
mistake. I myself rode to a point on those breastworks at which
there was no force whatever. The unprotected space was broad
enough for the easy passage of Early's army without resistance.
It is true that, as we approached, Rodes's division had driven in
some skirmishers, and during the day (July 11th) another small
affair had occurred on the Seventh Street road; but all the
Federals encountered on this approach could not have manned
any considerable portion of the defences. Undoubtedly we could
have marched into Washington; but in the council of war called
by General Early there was not a dissenting opinion as to the
impolicy of entering the city. While General Early and his division
commanders were considering in jocular vein the propriety

of putting General John C. Breckinridge at the head of the
column and of escorting him to the Senate chamber and seating
him again in the Vice-President's chair, the sore-footed men in
gray were lazily lounging about the cool waters of Silver Spring,
picking blackberries in the orchards of Postmaster-General Blair,
and merrily estimating the amount of gold and greenbacks that
would come into our possession when we should seize the vaults
of the United States Treasury. The privates also had opinions
about the wisdom or unwisdom of going into the city. One of
them who supposed we were going in asked another:

"I say, Mac, what do you suppose we are going to do with
the city of Washington when we take it?"

"That question reminds me," replied Mac, "of old Simon's
answer to Tony Towns when he asked Simon if he were not
afraid he would lose his dog that was running after every train
that came by. The old darky replied that he was not thinking
about losing his dog, but was just'wonderin' what dat dorg was
gwine do wid dem kyars when he kotched 'em.'" It is evident
that neither of these soldiers believed in the wisdom of any
serious effort to capture Washington at that time.

While we debated, the Federal troops were arriving from
Grant's army and entering the city on the opposite side.

The two objects of our approach to the national capital were,
first and mainly, to compel General Grant to detach a portion of
his army from Lee's front at Petersburg; and, second and
incidentally, to release, if possible, the Confederates held as
prisoners of war at Point Lookout. We had succeeded in
accomplishing only the first of these. We had, by the signal
victory over Lew Wallace's protecting army at Monocacy and
by the ring of our rifles in ear-shot of President Lincoln's
cabinet, created enough consternation to induce

the Federal authorities to debate the contingencies of our
entrance and to hurry Grant's troops across the Potomac.

The second object (the release of our prisoners confined at
Point Lookout) had to be abandoned at a somewhat earlier date
because of the inability to perfect needful antecedent
arrangements. Some days prior to our crossing the Potomac into
Maryland, General Lee wrote twice to President Davis (June
26th and 29th) touching the possibility of effecting this release. It
was General Lee's opinion that it would not require a large force
to accomplish this object. He said to the President: "I have
understood that most of the garrison at Point Lookout is
composed of negroes . . . . . A stubborn resistance, therefore, may
not reasonably be expected." He was ready to devote to the
enterprise the courage and dash of all Marylanders in his army.
The greatest difficulty, he thought, was to find a suitable leader,
as success in such a venture depended largely on the brains and
pluck of the man who guided it. He asked the President if such
a leader could be found; his own opinion was that General
Bradley T. Johnson of Maryland was the best man in his
acquaintance for this special work. Our march, however, toward
Washington was so rapid, and our retreat from it so necessary to
avoid being captured ourselves by the heavy forces just arriving
from Grant's army, coöperating with those forming in our rear,
that the recruiting of our ranks by releasing our expectant boys
at Point Lookout had to be abandoned. There was not time
enough for the delicate and difficult task of communicating
secretly with our prisoners so as to have them ready for prompt
coöperation in overpowering the negro guards, nor time for
procuring the flotillas necessary silently to transport across the
Potomac the forces who were to assault the fortress.

General Bradley Johnson captured at this time Major General
Franklin of the Union army, and the railroad train between
Washington and Philadelphia on which this distinguished
passenger was travelling. However, in the hurry of the
Confederates to get away from that point, General Franklin
made his escape.

Thenceforward to the end of July, through the entire month of
August, and during more than half of September, 1864, Early's
little army was marching and countermarching toward every
point of the compass in the Shenandoah Valley, with scarcely a
day of rest, skirmishing, fighting, rushing hither and thither to
meet and drive back cavalry raids, while General Sheridan
gathered his army of more than double our numbers for his
general advance up the valley.

General Jubal A. Early, who commanded the Confederate
forces in the Valley of Virginia in the autumn of 1864, was an
able strategist and one of the coolest and most imperturbable of
men under fire and in extremity. He had, however, certain
characteristics which militated against his achieving the greatest
successes. Like the brilliant George B. McClellan (whom I knew
personally and greatly admired), and like many other noted
soldiers who might be named in all armies, he lacked what I shall
term official courage, or what is known as the courage of one's
convictions--that courage which I think both Lee and Grant
possessed in an eminent degree, and which in Stonewall Jackson
was one of the prime sources of his marvellous achievements.
This peculiar courage must not be confounded with rashness,
although there is a certain similarity between them. They both
strike boldly, fiercely, and with all possible energy. They are,
however, as widely separated as the poles in other and essential
qualities. The rash officer's boldness is blind. He strikes in the
dark, madly, wildly, and often impotently. The possessor of the

courage which I am trying to describe is equally bold, but sees
with quick, clear, keen vision the weak and strong points in the
adversary, measures with unerring judgment his own strength and
resources, and then, with utmost faith in the result, devotes his all
to its attainment--and wins. Thus thought and thus fought
Jackson and many of the world's greatest leaders. Thus Lee's
faultless eye saw at Gettysburg, and thus he intended to strike
the last decisive blow on the morning of the third day; and if his
orders had been obeyed--if, as he directed, every unemployed
soldier of his army had been hurled at dawn against Meade's
centre, and with the impetuosity which his assurance of victory
should have imparted to General Longstreet--there is not a
reasonable doubt that the whole Union centre would have been
shattered, the two wings hopelessly separated, and the great
army in blue, like a mill-dam broken by the rushing current,
would have been swept away.

General Early possessed other characteristics peculiarly his
own, which were the parents of more or less trouble to him and
to those under him: namely, his indisposition to act upon
suggestions submitted by subordinates and his distrust of the
accuracy of reports by scouts, than whom there were no more
intelligent, reliable, and trustworthy men in the army. Incidentally
I alluded to this marked characteristic of General Early's mind in
speaking of his refusal to permit me to assail General Grant's
right flank on the 6th of May in the Wilderness until the day was
nearly gone and until General Lee himself ordered the attack.

General Early was a bachelor, with a pungent style of
commenting on things he did not like; but he had a kind heart and
was always courteous to women. As might be expected,
however, of a man who had passed the meridian of life without
marrying, he had little or no

patience with wives who insisted on following the army in order
to be near their husbands. There were numbers of women--
wives and mothers--who would gladly have accompanied their
husbands and sons had it been possible for them to do so. Mrs.
Gordon was one of the few who were able to consult their
wishes in this regard. General Early, hearing of her constant
presence, is said to have exclaimed, "I wish the Yankees would
capture Mrs. Gordon and hold her till the war is over!" Near
Winchester, as the wagon-trains were being parked at night, he
discovered a conveyance unlike any of the others that were
going into camp. He immediately called out to his quartermaster
in excited tones: "What 's that?" "That is Mrs. Gordon's carriage,
sir," replied the officer. "Well, I 'll be - - - - -! If my men would keep
up as she does, I 'd never issue another order against straggling."

Mrs. Gordon was fully aware of the general's sentiments, and
had heard of his wishing for her capture; and during a camp
dinner given in honor of General Ewell, she sat near General
Early and good-naturedly rallied him about it. He was
momentarily embarrassed, but rose to the occasion and replied:
"Mrs. Gordon, General Gordon is a better soldier when you are
close by him than when you are away, and so hereafter, when I
issue orders that officers' wives must go to the rear, you may
know that you are excepted." This gallant reply called forth a
round of applause from the officers at table.

Faithful and enterprising scouts, those keen-eyed, acute-eared,
and nimble-footed heralds of an army who, "light-armed, scour
each quarter to descry the distant foe," and who had been
hovering around the Union army for some days after it crossed
the Potomac, reported that General Sheridan was in command
and was approaching Winchester with a force greatly superior
to that commanded by General Early. The four divisions

of Early's little army were commanded at this time respectively
by General John C. Breckinridge, the "Kentucky Game-cock,"
by General Rodes of Alabama, who had few equals in either
army, by General Ramseur of North Carolina, who was a most
valiant and skillful leader of men, and by myself. These divisions
were widely separated from one another. They had been posted
by General Early in position for guarding the different
approaches to Winchester, and for easy concentration when the
exigencies of the campaign should require it. The reports of the
Federal approach, however, did not seem to impress General
Early, and he delayed the order for concentration until Sheridan
was upon him, ready to devour him piecemeal, a division at a
time. When at last the order came to me, on the Martinsburg
pike, to move with utmost speed to Winchester, the far-off
reverberant artillery was already giving painful notice that
Ramseur was fighting practically alone, while the increasingly
violent concussions were passionate appeals to the other
divisions for help.

As the fighting was near Winchester, through which Mrs.
Gordon was compelled to pass in going to the rear, she drove
rapidly down the pike in that direction. Her light conveyance
was drawn by two horses driven by a faithful negro boy, who
was as anxious to escape capture as she. As she overtook the
troops of General Rodes's division, marching to the aid of
Ramseur, and drove into their midst, a cloud of dust loomed up
in the rear, and a wild clatter of hoofs announced, "Cavalry in
pursuit!" General Rodes halted a body of his men, and threw
them in line across the pike, just behind Mrs. Gordon's carriage,
as she hurried on, urged by the solicitude of the "boys in gray"
around her. In crossing a wide stream, which they were
compelled to ford, the tongue of the carriage broke loose from
the axle. The horses went on, but Mrs. Gordon, the driver, and
carriage

were left in the middle of the stream. She barely escaped; for
the detachment of Union cavalry were
still in pursuit as a number of Confederate soldiers rushed into
the stream, dragged the carriage out, and by some temporary
makeshift attached the tongue and started her again on her
flight.

Ramseur's division was nearly overwhelmed and Rodes was
heavily pressed as the head of my column reached the crest
from which we could dimly discern the steady advance of the
blue lines through the murky clouds of mingled smoke and dust
that rose above the contending hosts.

Breckinridge's troops were also furiously fighting on another
part of the field, and they, too, were soon doubled up by charges
in front and on the flank.

This left practically only Rodes's division and mine, with parts
of Ramseur's bleeding brigades, not more than 6000 men in all,
to contend with Sheridan's whole army of about 30,000 men,
reaching in both directions far beyond our exposed right and left.
In the absence of specific orders from the commander-in-chief,
I rode up to Rodes for hasty conference. A moment's
interchange of views brought both of us to the conclusion that
the only chance to save our commands was to make an
impetuous and simultaneous charge with both divisions, in the
hope of creating confusion in Sheridan's lines, so that we might
withdraw in good order. As the last words between us were
spoken, Rodes fell, mortally wounded, near my horse's feet, and
was borne bleeding and almost lifeless to the rear.

There are times in battle--and they come often--when the
strain and the quick shifting of events compel the commander to
stifle sensibilities and silence the natural promptings of his heart
as cherished friends fall around him. This was one of those
occasions. General Rodes was not only a comrade whom I
greatly admired, but a

friend whom I loved. To ride away without even expressing to
him my deep grief was sorely trying to my feelings; but I had to
go. His fall had left both divisions to my immediate control for
the moment, and under the most perplexing and desperate
conditions.

The proposed assault on Sheridan's front was made with an
impetuosity that caused his advancing lines to halt, bend, and
finally to break at different points; but, his steadfast battalions,
which my divisions could not reach and which overlapped me in
both directions, quickly doubled around the unprotected right and
left, throwing the Confederate ranks into inextricable confusion
and making orderly retreat impossible. Meantime, that superb
fighter, General Wharton of Virginia, had repelled from my rear
and left flank a number of charges by Sheridan's cavalry; but
finally the overpowered Confederate cavalry was broken and
Wharton's infantry forced back, leaving the vast plain to our
left open for the almost unobstructed sweep of the Federal
horsemen.

General Breckinridge, who had scarcely a corporal's guard of
his magnificent division around him, rode to my side. His
Apollo-like face was begrimed with sweat and smoke. He was
desperately reckless--the impersonation of despair. He literally
seemed to court death. Indeed, to my protest against his
unnecessary exposure, by riding at my side, he said: "Well,
general, there is little left for me if our cause is to fail." Later,
when the cause had failed, he acted upon this belief and left the
country, and only returned after long absence, to end his brilliant
career in coveted privacy among his Kentucky friends.

To my horror, as I rode among my disorganized troops
through Winchester I found Mrs. Gordon on the street, where
shells from Sheridan's batteries were falling and Minié balls
flying around her. She was apparently unconscious

of the danger. I had supposed that, in accordance with
instructions, she had gone to the rear at the opening of the battle,
and was many miles away. But she was stopping at the house of
her friend Mrs. Hugh Lee, and as the first Confederates began to
pass to the rear, she stood upon the veranda, appealing to them to
return to the front. Many yielded to her entreaties and turned back--
one waggish fellow shouting aloud to his comrades: "Come, boys,
let 's go back. We might not obey the general, but we can't resist
Mrs. Gordon." The fact is, it was the first time in all her army
experience that she had ever seen the Confederate lines broken.
As the different squads passed, she inquired to what command
they belonged. When, finally, to her question the answer came,
"We are Gordon's men," she lost her self-control, and rushed into
the street, urging them to go back and meet the enemy. She was
thus engaged when I found her. I insisted that she go immediately
into the house, where she would be at least partially protected.
She obeyed; but she did not for a moment accept my statement
that there was nothing left for her except capture by Sheridan's
army. I learned afterward that her negro driver had been
frightened by the shells bursting about the stable, and had not
brought out her carriage and horses. She acquainted some of my
men with these facts. With the assurance, "We 'll get it for you,
Mrs. Gordon," they broke down the fences and brought the
carriage to her a few moments after I had passed on. She sprang
into it, and, taking her six-year-old son Frank and one or two
wounded officers with her, she was driven rapidly away amidst
the flying missiles from Sheridan's advancing troops and with the
prayers of my brave men for her safety.

The pursuit was pressed far into the twilight, and only ended
when night came and dropped her protecting curtains around
us.

Drearily and silently, with burdened brains and aching
hearts, leaving our dead and many of the wounded behind us, we
rode hour after hour, with our sore-footed, suffering men doing
their best to keep up, anxiously inquiring for their commands and
eagerly listening for orders to halt and sleep.

Lucky was the Confederate private who on that mournful
retreat know his own captain, and most lucky was the
commander who knew where to find the main body of his own
troops. The only lamps to guide us were the benignant stars,
dimly lighting the gray surface of the broad limestone turnpike. It
was, however, a merciful darkness. It came too slowly for our
comfort; but it came at last, and screened our weary and
confused infantry from further annoyance by Sheridan's
horsemen. Little was said by any officer. Each was left to his
own thoughts and the contemplation of the shadows that were
thickening around us. What was the morrow to bring, or the next
month, or the next year? There was no limit to lofty courage, to
loyal devotion, and the spirit of self-sacrifice; but where were the
men to come from to take the places of the maimed and the
dead? Where were the arsenals from which to replace the
diminishing materials of war so essential to our future defence? It
was evident that these thoughts were running through the brains
of rank and file; for now and then there came a cheering flash of
rustic wit or grim humor from the privates: "Cheer up, boys;
don't be worried. We'll lick them Yankees the first fair chance,
and get more grub and guns and things than our poor old
quartermaster mules can pull." Distinct in my memory now (they
will be there till I die) are those startling manifestations of a spirit
which nothing could break, that strange commingling of deep-drawn sighs and
merry songs, the marvellous blending of an hour
of despair with an hour of bounding hope, inspired

At a late hour of the night on that doleful retreat, the
depressing silence was again broken by a characteristic shot at
General Breckinridge from Early's battery of good-natured
sarcasm, which was always surcharged and ready to go off at
the slightest touch. These two soldiers became very good friends
after the war began, but previously they had held antagonistic
political views. Early was an uncompromising Unionist until
Virginia passed the ordinance of secession. Breckinridge, on the
other hand, had long been a distinguished champion of what was
called "the rights of the South in the Territories," and in 1860 he
was nominated for President by the "Southern Rights" wing of
the Democratic party. The prospect of establishing Southern
rights by arms was not encouraging on that dismal retreat from
Winchester. General Early could not resist the temptation
presented by the conditions around us; and, at a time when the
oppressive stillness was disturbed only by the dull sound of
tramping feet and tinkling canteens, his shrill tones rang out:

"General Breckinridge, what do you think of the rights of the
South in the Territories' now?"

Breckinridge made no reply. He was in no humor for
badinage, or for reminiscences of the period of his political
power when he was Kentucky's most eloquent representative in
the halls of Congress, or pleaded for Southern rights on the
floor of the Senate, or made parliamentary rulings as
Vice-President of the United States, or carried the flag of a great
party as its selected candidate for the still higher office of
President.

When the night was far spent and a sufficient distance
between the Confederate rear and Union front had been
reached, there came the order to halt--more grateful than
sweetest music to the weary soldiers' ears; and down

they dropped upon their beds of grass or earth, their heads
pillowed on dust-covered knapsacks, their rifles at their sides,
and their often shoeless feet bruised and aching.

But they slept. Priceless boon--sleep and rest for tired frame
and heart and brain!

General Sheridan graciously granted us two days and a part
of the third to sleep and rest and pull ourselves together for the
struggle of September 22. The battle, or, to speak more
accurately, the bout at Fisher's Hill, was so quickly ended that it
may be described in a few words. Indeed, to all experienced
soldiers the whole story is told in one word--"flanked."

We had again halted and spread our banners on the ramparts
which nature built along the Shenandoah's banks. Our stay was
short, however, and our leaving was hurried, without ceremony
or concert. It is the old story of failure to protect flanks.
Although the Union forces more than doubled Early's army, our
position was such that in our stronghold we could have whipped
General Sheridan had the weak point on our left been sufficiently
protected. Sheridan demonstrated in front while he slipped his
infantry around our left and completely enveloped that flank. An
effort was made to move Battle and Wharton to the enveloped
flank in order to protect it, but the effort was made too late. The
Federals saw their advantage, and seized and pressed it. The
Confederates saw the hopelessness of their situation, and
realized that they had only the option of retreat or capture. They
were not long in deciding. The retreat (it is always so) was at
first stubborn and slow, then rapid, then--a rout.

It is not just to blame the troops. There are conditions in war
when courage, firmness, steadiness of nerve, and self-reliance
are of small avail. Such were the conditions at Fisher's Hill.

CHAPTER XXIV

CEDAR CREEK--A VICTORY AND A DEFEAT

Sheridan's dallying for twenty-six days--Arrival of General Kershaw--
Position of Early's army with reference to Sheridan's--The outlook from
Massanutten Mountain--Weakness of Sheridan's left revealed--The plan
of battle--A midnight march-- Complete surprise and rout of Sheridan's
army--Early's decision not to follow up the victory--Why Sheridan's ride
succeeded--Victory changed into defeat.

NEARLY a month--twenty-six days, to be exact--of
comparative rest and recuperation ensued after Fisher's Hill.
General Sheridan followed our retreat very languidly. The record
of one day did not differ widely from the record of every other
day of the twenty-six. His cavalry manoeuvred before ours, and
ours manoeuvred before his. His artillery saluted, and ours
answered. His infantry made demonstrations, and ours responded
by forming lines. This was all very fine for Early's battered little
army; and it seemed that Sheridan's victories of the 19th and 22d
had been so costly, notwithstanding his great preponderance in
numbers, that he sympathized with our desire for a few weeks of
dallying. He appeared to be anxious to do just enough to keep us
reminded that he was still there. So he decided upon a season of
burning, instead of battling; of assaults with matches and torches
upon barns and hay stacks, instead of upon armed men who
were lined up in front of him.

distasteful one to me. It would be far more agreeable to applaud
and eulogize every officer in both armies of whom it is necessary
for me to speak. But if I write at all, I must write as I think. I
must be honest with myself, and honest with those who may do
me the honor to read what I write. In a former chapter I have
already spoken of General Sheridan as probably the most brilliant
cavalry officer who fought on the Union side. I shall not be
misunderstood, therefore, when I say that his twenty-six days of
apparent indecision, of feeble pursuit, of discursive and disjointed
fighting after his two crushing victories, are to me a military
mystery. Why did he halt or hesitate, why turn to the torch in the
hope of starving his enemy, instead of beating him in resolute
battle? Would Grant have thus hesitated for a month or a day
under such conditions--with a broken army in his front, and his
own greatly superior in numbers and inspired by victory? How
long would it require any intelligent soldier who fought under
Grant, or against him, to answer that question?

General Meade was criticised for the delay of a single day at
Gettysburg--for not assailing the Confederate army the next
morning after the last Southern assault--after the brilliant charge
and bloody repulse of Pickett's command. From the standpoint of
a Confederate who participated in the conflicts both at
Gettysburg and in the Valley, I feel impelled to say, and with
absolute impartiality, that the Union archers who from sheltered
positions in Washington hurled their sharpened arrows at Union
generals in the field for not gathering the fruits of victory must
have emptied their quivers into Meade, or have broken their
bows prior to that month of Sheridan's campaigning after the
19th and 22d of September.

From my point of view, it is easy to see why Meade halted after
the Confederate repulse of the last day at

Gettysburg. In his front was Robert E. Lee, still resolute and
defiant. The Confederate commander had not been driven one
foot from his original position. He was supported by an army still
complete in organization, with faith in its great leader and its own
prowess undiminished, eagerly waiting for the Union troops to
leave the trenches, and ready at Lee's command to retrieve in
open field and at any sacrifice the loss of the victory which it had
been impossible to wrench from Meade's splendid army
intrenched on the heights and flanked by the Round Tops. It is
not so easy, however, to furnish an explanation for Sheridan's
indecision after Winchester and Fisher's Hill. There was no
Robert E. Lee in his front, inspiring unfaltering faith. The men
before whom Sheridan hesitated were not complete in
organization, as were the men at Gettysburg, who still held their
original lines and were still confident of victory in open field. On
the contrary, the army before him, although not demoralized, was
vastly inferior to his own in numbers and equipment--of which fact
every officer and private was cognizant. It had been shattered
and driven in precipitate flight from every portion of both fields.
Why did General Sheridan hesitate to hurl his inspirited and
overwhelming army upon us? Why retreat and intrench and wait
to be assaulted? Was it because of commanding necessity, or
from what George Washington would have termed "untimely
discretion"?

Taking advantage of Sheridan's tardiness, Early withdrew
from the main pike to Brown's Gap in order to refresh his little
army. Brown's Gap was the same grand amphitheatre in the
Blue Ridge Mountains in which General Jackson had rested two
years before, during that wonderful campaign so graphically
described by Colonel Henderson, of the British army, in his "Life
of Stonewall Jackson." In that campaign, Jackson had baffled
and beaten four Union armies, under Milroy,

Banks, Frémont, and Shields, each larger than his own; and
having thus cleared the Valley of Federal troops, had promptly
joined in the seven days' battles around Richmond, which drove
McClellan to the protection of his gunboats, and prevented a
long siege of the Confederate capital.

This reference to Early's encampment on the mountain-rimmed
plateau, to which Jackson withdrew at intervals in his
marvellous campaign, reminds me that unfair contrasts have
been drawn between the results achieved by these two generals
in the same Valley. It is only just to General Early to call
attention to the fact that General Jackson was never, in any one
of his great battles, there, so greatly outnumbered as was
General Early at Winchester and Fisher's Hill. Early had in
neither of these battles more than 10,000 men, including all arms
of the service, while the Official Reports show that General
Sheridan brought against him over 30,000 well-equipped troops.
The marvel is that Early was not utterly routed and his army
captured by the Union cavalry in the early morning at
Winchester; for, at the opening of the battle, Early's divisions
were separated by a greater distance than intervened between
Sheridan and the Confederate command which he first struck.
The magnificently mounted and equipped Union cavalry alone
very nearly equalled in number Early's entire army. With an open
country and fordable streams before him, with an immense
preponderance in numbers, it seems incomprehensible that
General Sheridan should have failed to destroy utterly General
Early's army by promptly and vigorously following up the
advantages resulting at Winchester and Fisher's Hill.

While we were resting on Jackson's "old campground," which
kind nature seemed to have supplied as an inspiring and secure
retreat for the defenders of the Valley, General Kershaw, who
was one of the ablest

division commanders in Lee's army, came with his dashing
South Carolinians to reënforce and cheer Early's
brave and weary men. The most seasoned American
troops, and especially volunteer forces, composed largely
of immature boys, are under such conditions as subject
to capricious humors as are volatile Frenchmen. This
was true at least of the warm-hearted, impetuous Southern
boys who filled our ranks. But no change of conditions or
sudden caprice ever involved the slightest
diminution of devotion to the Southern cause. Whether
victorious or defeated, they were always resolved to
fight it out to the last extremity. The arrival of Kershaw's
division awakened the latent enthusiasm with
which they had pommelled Sheridan at the beginning
of the battle of Winchester, but which had been made
dormant by the subsequent disastrous defeats on that
field and at Fisher's Hill. The news of Kershaw's approach
ran along the sleeping ranks, and aroused them
as if an electric battery had been sending its stimulating
current through their weary bodies. Cheer after cheer
came from their husky throats and rolled along the
mountain cliffs, the harbinger of a coming victory.
"Hurrah for the Palmetto boys!" "Glad to see you,
South Ca'liny!" "Whar did you come from?" "Did
you bring any more guns for Phil Sheridan?" We
had delivered a number of guns to that officer without
taking any receipts for them; but the Confederate authorities
at Richmond were still straining every nerve to
supply us with more. Among the pieces of artillery
sent us by the War Department was a long black rifle-cannon,
on which some wag had printed in white letters
words to this effect: "Respectfully consigned to General
Sheridan through General Early"; and Sheridan got it.
Some days later at Cedar Creek, or on some other field,
Sheridan's men captured the gun which had been consigned
to him "through General Early."

On the morning of the surrender at Appomattox, just
prior to the meeting of Lee and Grant, General Sheridan
referred, in our conversation, to this incident.

The arrival of reënforcements under Kershaw not only
revived the hopes of our high-mettled men, but enabled General
Early and his division commanders to await with confidence
General Sheridan's advance, which was daily expected. He did
not come, however. Our rations were nearly exhausted, and after
holding a council of war, General Early decided to advance upon
the Union forces strongly intrenched on the left bank of Cedar
Creek.

No battle of the entire war, with the single exception of
Gettysburg, has provoked such varied and conflicting
comments and such prolonged controversy as this remarkable
engagement between Sheridan and Early at Cedar Creek. No
battle has been so greatly misunderstood in important particulars,
nor have the accounts of any battle been so productive of
injustice to certain actors in it, nor so strangely effective in
converting misapprehensions into so-called history. Some of
these misapprehensions I shall endeavor to correct in this and
succeeding chapters; and, so far as I am able, I shall do justice to
the men to whom it has been denied for so many years. I do not
underestimate the nature of the task I now undertake; but every
statement made by me bearing on controverted points will be
supported by the Official Records which the Government has
published in recent years, and by other incontrovertible proofs. It
is enough to say, in explanation of this long-deferred effort on my
part, that I had no access to official reports until they were made
public; and until very recently I did not doubt that my own official
report of Cedar Creek would be published with others, and stand
beside the others, and that the facts stated in my report would
vindicate the brave men who fought that marvellous

battle. It seems, however, that my report never reached General
Lee, or was lost when his official papers were captured at the
fall of the Confederate capital.

On the right of the Confederate line, as drawn up at Fisher's
Hill, was Massanutten Mountain, rising to a great height, and so
rugged and steep as to make our position practically unassailable
on that flank. It was also the generally accepted belief that this
mountain was an absolute barrier against any movement by our
army in that direction. The plan of battle, therefore, which had
been adopted was to move upon Sheridan in the other direction
or by our left. I was not entirely satisfied with the general plan of
attack, and decided to go to the top of the mountain, where a
Confederate Signal Corps had been placed, and from that lofty
peak to survey and study Sheridan's position and the topography
of the intervening country. I undertook the ascent of the rugged
steep, accompanied by that superb officer, General Clement A.
Evans of Georgia, in whose conservatism and sound judgment I
had the most implicit confidence, and by Captain Hotchkiss1 of General Early's
staff, and my chief of staff, Major Robert W. Hunter. Through
tangled underbrush and over giant
boulders and jutting cliffs we finally reached the summit, from
which the entire landscape was plainly visible. It
was an inspiring panorama. With strong field-glasses, every
road and habitation and hill and stream could be seen and noted.
The abruptly curved and precipitous
highlands bordering Cedar Creek, on which the army of
Sheridan was strongly posted; the historic Shenandoah, into
which Cedar Creek emptied at the foot of the towering peak on
which we stood, and, most important and intensely interesting of
all, the entire Union army--all

1 See Journal of Captain Jed Hotchkiss of General Early's staff, penned at
the time, and published in War Records, First Series, Vol. XLIII, Part I,
p. 580, Monday, October 17.

seemed but a stone's throw away from us as we stood
contemplating the scene through the magnifying lenses of our
field-glasses. Not only the general outlines of Sheridan's
breastworks, but every parapet where his heavy guns were
mounted, and every piece of artillery, every wagon and tent and
supporting line of troops, were in easy range of our vision. I
could count, and did count, the number of his guns. I could see
distinctly the three colors of trimmings on the jackets
respectively of infantry, artillery, and cavalry, and locate each,
while the number of flags gave a basis for estimating
approximately the forces with which we were to contend in the
proposed attack. If, however, the plan of battle which at once
suggested itself to my mind should be adopted, it mattered little
how large a force General Sheridan had; for the movement
which I intended to propose contemplated the turning of
Sheridan's flank where he least expected it, a sudden irruption
upon his left and rear, and the complete surprise of his entire
army.

It was unmistakably evident that General Sheridan concurred
in the universally accepted opinion that it was impracticable for
the Confederates to pass or march along the rugged and almost
perpendicular face of Massanutten Mountain and assail his left.
This fact was made manifest at the first sweep of the eye from
that mountain-top. For he had left that end of his line with no
protection save the natural barriers, and a very small
detachment of cavalry on the left bank of the river, with
vedettes on their horses in the middle of the stream. His entire
force of superb cavalry was massed on his right, where he
supposed, as all others had supposed, that General Early must
come, if he came with any hope of success. The disposition of
his divisions and available resources were all for defence of his
right flank and front, or for aggressive movement from one or
both

of these points. As to his left flank--well, that needed no
defence; the impassable Massanutten, with the Shenandoah
River at its base, was the sufficient protecting fortress. Thus
reasoned the commanders of each of the opposing armies. Both
were of the same mind, and Early prepared to assail, and
Sheridan to defend, his right and centre only. Captain Hotchkiss,
who was an engineer, made a rough map of the positions in our
view.

It required, therefore, no transcendent military genius to
decide quickly and unequivocally upon the movement which the
conditions invited. I was so deeply impressed by the situation
revealed to us, so sure that it afforded an opportunity for an
overwhelming Confederate victory, that I expressed to those
around me the conviction that if General Early would adopt the
plan of battle which I would submit, and would press it to its
legitimate results, the destruction of Sheridan's army was
inevitable. Indeed, there are those still living who remember my
statement that if General Early would acquiesce, and the plan
failed, I would assume the responsibility of failure.1 Briefly, the
plan was to abandon serious attack of Sheridan's forces where
all things were in readiness, making only a demonstration upon
that right flank by Rosser's cavalry dismounted, and upon the
centre by a movement of infantry and artillery along the pike,
while the heavy and decisive blow should be given upon the
Union left, where no preparation was made to resist us. This
movement on the left I myself proposed to make with the
Second Army Corps, led by General Clement A. Evans's
division, followed by Ramseur's and Pegram's.

"But how are you going to pass the precipice of
Massanutten Mountain?"

That was the one obstacle in the way of the successful

1 See statements of General Evans, General Rosser, General Wharton, Major R.
W. Hunter, and of Thomas G. Jones, ex-governor of Alabama and now United
States judge.

execution of the plan I intended to submit, and I felt sure that
this could be overcome. A dim and narrow pathway was found,
along which but one man could pass at a time; but by beginning
the movement at nightfall the entire corps could be passed
before daylight.

This plan was finally adopted by General Early, and the
movement was begun with the coming of the darkness. The men
were stripped of canteens and of everything calculated to make
noise and arouse Sheridan's pickets below us, and our watches
were set so that at the same moment the right, the centre, and
the left of Sheridan should be assaulted. With every man, from
the commanders of divisions to the brave privates under them,
impressed with the gravity of our enterprise, speaking only when
necessary and then in whispers, and striving to suppress every
sound, the long gray line like a great serpent glided noislessly
along the dim pathway above the precipice. Before the hour
agreed upon for the simultaneous attack, my entire command
had slowly and safely passed the narrow and difficult defile.

Some watchful and keen-eyed Confederate thought he
discovered ahead of us two of the enemy's pickets. If they
should fire their rifles it would give to Sheridan's vedettes the
alarm and possibly seriously interfere with our success. I sent
Jones of my staff, with a well-trained scout and one or two
others, noiselessly to capture them. Concealing their movements
behind a fence until near the point where the pickets stood, my
men crawled on hands and knees, and were in the act of
demanding surrender when they discovered that the two hostile
figures were cedar-bushes in the corner of the rail fence.

Late in the afternoon I had directed that one of my couriers
be stationed at every fork of the dim pathway after it left the
mountain, to avoid the possibility of missing the way which I had
selected to the ford of the river. At one fork, however, a small
tree across the right-hand

road was sufficient to guide us into the road on the left,
which was the proper one. Late that afternoon, a farmer passed
with his wagon and threw this sapling across the other road. But
small things impress themselves very vividly at such momentous
times, and when we reached that point in our night march I
thought at once that the tree had been moved. To leave no doubt
on so vital a point, a member of my staff inquired at a near-by
cabin, and we had our impressions confirmed by the old man who
had come so near being the innocent cause of our taking the road
away from the ford. On such small things sometimes hangs the
fate of great battles.

For nearly an hour we waited for the appointed time, resting
near the bank of the river in the middle of which the Union
vedettes sat upon their horses, wholly unconscious of the
presence of the gray-jacketed foe, who from the ambush of night,
like crouching lions from the jungle, were ready to spring upon
them. The whole situation was unspeakably impressive.
Everything conspired to make the conditions both thrilling and
weird. The men were resting, lying in long lines on the thickly
matted grass or reclining in groups, their hearts thumping, their
ears eagerly listening for the orders: "Attention, men!" "Fall in!"
"Forward!" At brief intervals members of the staff withdrew
to a point where they could safely strike a match and examine
watches in order to keep me advised of the time. In the still starlit
night, the only sounds heard were the gentle rustle of leaves by
the October wind, the low murmur of the Shenandoah flowing
swiftly along its rocky bed and dashing against the limestone cliffs
that bordered it, the churning of the water by the feet of horses
on which sat Sheridan's faithful pickets, and the subdued tones or
half-whispers of my men as they thoughtfully communed with
each other as to the fate which might befall each in the next
hour.

It was during this weird time of waiting that my comrade and
friend, General Ramseur, had that wonderful presentiment of his
coming fate. Before the battle ended, his premonition had been
proved a literal prophecy, and his voice was silenced forever.

His mantle fell upon one worthy to wear it. General Bryan
Grimes of North Carolina had already distinguished himself
among the illustrious sons of a State prolific in a soldiery
unsurpassed in any war, and his record as chief of this stalwart
command added to his high reputation.

The minute-hand of the watch admonished us that it was time
to move in order to reach Sheridan's flank at the hour agreed
upon. General Payne of Virginia, one of the ablest and most
knightly soldiers in the Confederate army, plunged with his
intrepid cavalry into the river, and firing as they went upon
Sheridan's mounted pickets and supporting squadrons, the
Virginians dashed in pursuit as if in steeplechase with the Union
riders, the coveted goal for both being the rear of Sheridan's
army. The Federals sought it for safety. Payne was seeking it to
spread confusion and panic in the Federal ranks and camps; and
magnificently did he accomplish his purpose.

In my survey of the field from the mountain-top I had located
Sheridan's headquarters; and this daring Virginian
enthusiastically agreed to ride into the Union camps on the heels
of the flying body of Federal cavalry, and, by sudden dash at
headquarters, attempt to capture the commander-in-chief and
bring him back as a cavalry trophy.

As soon as Payne had cleared the ford for the infantry,
Evans, with his Virginians, North Carolinians, and Georgians, the
old Stonewall Brigade leading, rushed into the cold current of the
Shenandoah, chilled as it was by

the October nights and frosts. The brave fellows did not hesitate
for a moment. Reaching the eastern bank drenched and cold,
they were ready for the "double quick," which warmed them up
and brought them speedily to the left flank of Sheridan's sleeping
army. From that eyry on the mountain-top I had selected a
country road which led to the flank, and had located a white
farm-house which stood on this road at a point
precisely opposite the end of Sheridan's intrenchments. I knew,
therefore, that when the head of my column reached that house
we would be on the Union flank and
slightly in the rear. No time, therefore, was lost in scouting or in
locating lines. There was no need for either. There was not a
moment's delay. Nothing was
needed except to close up, front face, and forward. This was
accomplished by Evans with remarkable celerity. His splendid
division, with Ramseur's farther to the
right and Pegram's in support, rushed upon the unprepared and
unsuspecting Federals, great numbers of whom were still asleep
in their tents. Even those who had been aroused by Payne's
sudden irruption in the rear, and had sprung to the defence of
the breastworks, were thrown into the wildest confusion and
terror by Kershaw's simultaneous assault in front. That
admirable officer had more than filled his part in this game of
battle. He had not only demonstrated against the centre while
Evans was assailing flank and rear, but his high-spirited South
Carolinians, like a resistless sea driven by the
tempest, poured a steady stream of gray-jackets over the works
and into the Union camp. The intrepid Wharton was soon across
with his superb division, adding momentum to the jubilant
Confederate host.

The surprise was complete. The victory was won in a space
of time inconceivably short, and with a loss to the Confederates
incredibly small. Sheridan's brave men had lain down in their
tents on the preceding night

feeling absolutely protected by his intrenchments and his faithful
riflemen who stood on guard. They were startled in their dreams
and aroused from their slumbers by the rolls of musketry in
nearly every direction around them, and terrified by the whizzing
of Minié balls through their tents and the yelling of exultant
foemen in their very midst. They sprang from their beds to find
Confederate bayonets at their breasts. Large numbers were
captured. Many hundreds were shot down as they attempted to
escape. Two entire corps, the Eighth and Nineteenth,
constituting more than two thirds of Sheridan's army, broke and
fled, leaving the ground covered with arms, accoutrements,
knapsacks, and the dead bodies of their comrades. Across the
open fields they swarmed in utter disorganization, heedless of
their officers' commands--heedless of all things save getting to
the rear. There was nothing else for them to do; for Sheridan's
magnificent cavalry was in full retreat before Rosser's bold
troopers, who were in position to sweep down upon the other
Union flank and rear.

At little after sunrise we had captured nearly all of the Union
artillery; we had scattered in veriest rout two thirds of the Union
army; while less than one third of the Confederate forces had
been under fire, and that third intact and jubilant. Only the Sixth
Corps of Sheridan's entire force held its ground. It was on the
right rear and had been held in reserve. It stood like a
granite breakwater, built to beat back the oncoming flood; but
it was also doomed unless some marvellous intervention should
check the Confederate concentration which was forming against
it. That intervention did occur, as will be seen; and it was a truly
marvellous intervention, because it came from the Confederate
commander himself. Sheridan's Sixth Corps was so situated after
the other corps were dispersed, that nothing could have saved it
if the arrangement for its destruction had been carried

out. It was at that hour largely outnumbered, and I had
directed every Confederate command then subject to my orders
to assail it in front and upon both flanks
simultaneously. At the same time I had directed the brilliant chief
of artillery, Colonel Thomas H. Carter of Virginia, who had no
superior in ability and fighting qualities in that arm of the service
in either army, to gallop along the broad highway with all his
batteries and with every piece of captured artillery available, and
to pour an incessant stream of shot and shell upon this solitary
remaining corps, explaining to him at the same time the
movements I had ordered the infantry to make. As Colonel
Carter surveyed the position of Sheridan's Sixth Corps (it could
not have been better placed for our purposes), he exclaimed:
"General, you will need no infantry. With enfilade fire from my
batteries I will destroy that corps in twenty minutes."

At this moment General Early came upon the field, and said:

"Well, Gordon, this is glory enough for one day. This is the
19th. Precisely one month ago to-day we were going in the
opposite direction."

His allusion was to our flight from Winchester on the 19th of
September. I replied: "It is very well so far, general; but we have
one more blow to strike, and then there will not be left an
organized company of infantry in Sheridan's army."

I pointed to the Sixth Corps and explained the movements I
had ordered, which I felt sure would compass the capture of
that corps--certainly its destruction. When I had finished, he said:
"No use in that; they will all go directly."

"That is the Sixth Corps, general. It will not go, unless we
drive it from the field."

halt on the first clay at Gettysburg, and of the whole day's
hesitation to permit an assault on Grant's exposed flank on the
6th of May in the Wilderness, rose before me. And so it came to
pass that the fatal halting, the hesitation, the spasmodic firing,
and the isolated movements in the face of the sullen, slow, and
orderly retreat of this superb Federal corps, lost us the great
opportunity, and converted the brilliant victory of the morning
into disastrous defeat in the evening.

Congress thanked General Sheridan and his men for having
"averted a great disaster." By order of the President, he was
made a major-general, because, as stated in the order, "under the
blessing of Providence his routed army was reorganized and a
great national disaster averted," etc. Medical Director Ghiselin,
in his official report, says: "At dawn on the 19th of October the
enemy attacked and turned the left flank of the army. Their
attack was so sudden and unexpected that our troops were
thrown into confusion, and it was not until we had fallen back
four miles that another line of battle was established and
confidence restored." In the itinerary of the Second Brigade (p.
74), dated October 19, are these words: "For a time the foe was
held in check, but soon they had completely routed the Eighth
and Nineteenth corps, and the Sixth Corps fell back." General
Sheridan says in his report that he met these flying troops at nine
o'clock in the morning within half a mile of Winchester. "Until
the middle of the day the game was completely in the enemy's
hands," is the Federal record of another itinerary (p. 82, Vol.
XLIII). Impartial history must declare that, under these
conditions, if one more heavy blow had been delivered with
unhesitating energy, with Jacksonian confidence and vigor, and
with the combined power of every heavy gun and every exultant
soldier of Early's army, the battle would have ended in one of the
most complete and inexpensive victories

ever won in war. The now established facts warrant this
assertion. Although Sheridan's army at the beginning of the battle
outnumbered Early's, according to official reports, nearly or quite
three to one,1 yet the complete surprise of our sudden attack at
dawn upon flank and rear had placed the brave men in blue at
such disadvantage that more than two thirds of them were
compelled to fly or be captured. Thus before eight o'clock in the
morning the Confederate infantry outnumbered the organized
Federal forces in our front. At this hour the one army was
aroused and electrified by victory, while all that remained of the
other was necessarily dismayed by the most adverse conditions,
especially by the panic that had seized and shaken to pieces the
Eighth and Nineteenth corps.

The brave and steady Sixth Corps could not possibly have
escaped had the proposed concentration upon it

1 General Early's army was scarcely 12,000 strong. On October 25 General
Sheridan telegraphed General Grant from Cedar Creek: "We are now reduced to
effective force of not over 22,000 infantry." Add to this his heavy force of
cavalry, his artillery, his killed and wounded at Cedar Creek, and the 1300
prisoners, and it becomes evident that his army at the beginning of the battle
of the 19th was not less than 35,000.

The official returns regarding the Valley campaign are very meagre, and the
computation of the strength of the respective armies made by writers on the war
are indefinite and unsatisfactory.

Sheridan's official return of September 10, 1864, shows his effective force as
45,487 (Official Records, XLIII, Part I, p. 61); "Battles and Leaders of the
Civil War" states that of these about 43,000 were available for active field
duty.

Estimates of Early's army at Winchester:

"Battles and Leaders" states that monthly returns for August 31 (exclusive of
Kershaw's troops, who were not engaged) show an effective force of infantry and
artillery of 10,646. To this are added 1200 cavalry under Fitz Lee and 1700
under Lomax, making a total of 13,288. The figures given for cavalry under Lee
and Lomax were given the editors by General Early in a letter, so they may not
be disputed. Early claims, however, that the figures for infantry and artillery
are placed too high--that between August 31 and September 19 his losses were
considerable, and that at Winchester he had only 8500 muskets.

and around it been permitted. Within twenty minutes that
isolated command would have had Carter's thirty or forty guns
hurling their whizzing shells and solid shot, like so many
shivering lightning-bolts, through its entire lines. Within thirty
minutes the yelling Confederate infantry would have been
rushing resistlessly upon its flanks and front and rear. No troops
on earth could have withstood such unprecedented
disadvantages, such a combination of death-dealing agencies.

But the concentration was stopped; the blow was not
delivered. We halted, we hesitated, we dallied, firing a few shots
here, attacking with a brigade or a division there, and before
such feeble assaults the superb Union corps retired at intervals
and by short stages. We waited--for what? It is claimed by the
Confederate commander that we were threatened with cavalry
on our right, whereas General L. L. Lomax of the Confederate
cavalry, who combined the high qualities of great courage and
wise caution, was on that flank and had already advanced to a
point within a few miles of Winchester. It is also true that the
Federal reports show that Union cavalry was sent to that flank
to prevent our turning Sheridan's left, and was sent back to
Sheridan's right when it was discovered that there was no
danger of serious assault by Early's army. We waited--waited
for weary hours; waited till those stirring, driving, and able
Federal leaders, Wright, Crook, and Getty, could gather again
their shattered fragments; waited till the routed men in blue
found that no foe was pursuing them and until they had time to
recover their normal composure and courage; waited till
Confederate officers lost hope and the fires had gone out in the
hearts of the privates, who for hours had been asking, "What is
the matter? Why don't we go forward?"--waited for Sheridan to make
his ride, rally and bring back his routed army, mass it upon our
left flank in

broad daylight and assail us, and thus rout our whole army just
as, eight hours before, we had under cover of darkness massed
upon and assailed his left flank and routed two thirds of his
army.

General Sheridan had not slept on the field the preceding night.
He was absent--had gone, I believe, to Washington;
and if Payne had succeeded in capturing
the commanding Union general, as he came near doing, he
would have discovered that he had not secured the man he
wanted. Sheridan, however, was on his way
back to the front. At Winchester he heard the distant thunder as
it rolled down the Valley from Cedar Creek. The western wind
brought to his ears what Patrick
Henry called "the clash of resounding arms"; and he started in
the direction from which came the roar of the storm. As he rode
up the historic pike he met his broken and scattered corps, flying
in dismay from an
army which was not pursuing them, running pell-mell to the rear
from the same foe which, just one month before, they had
pursued in the opposite direction and over the same ground.

The Federal General Wright, to whom tardy justice--if justice
at all--has been done (and who suffered the same defeat from
our flank movement which would have overtaken General
Sheridan had he been there), had done all that any officer could
do to stem the resistless
Confederate rush in the early morning. This gallant Union
officer had already begun to rally his scattered forces to the
support of the Sixth Corps, before whose front we had strangely
dallied for six precious hours.
In paying this altogether insufficient tribute to General Wright,
whose valor and skill had been manifested in
many battles, in no sense do I disparage the achievement
of Philip Sheridan. He deserved much, and richly did his
grateful countrymen reward him. His energy and dash were
equal to the demands upon them. His was a

clear case of veni, vidi, vici. He halted and rallied and enthused
his panic-stricken men. While we waited he reorganized his
dismembered regiments, brigades, and divisions, and turned them
back toward the lines from which they had fled in veriest panic.

His movements were seen by the clear eyes of the vigilant
Confederate Signal Corps from their lofty perch on Massanutten
Mountain. Their flags at once waved left and right and front,
signalling to us the news, "The Yankees are halting and
reforming." Next, "They are moving back, some on the main
pike and some on other roads." Next, "The enemy's cavalry has
checked Rosser's pursuit and assumed the offensive."

Rosser was greatly outnumbered by Sheridan's cavalry,
which, supported as it now was by two corps of rallied infantry,
drove, in turn, these sturdy Confederate horsemen to the rear.
They contested, however, every foot of advance, and joined our
Signal Corps in sending information of the heavy column
approaching.

The flag signals from the mountain and the messages from
Rosser became more intense in their warning and more frequent
as the hours passed. Sheridan's marchers were coming closer
and massing in heavy column on the left, while his cavalry were
gathering on our flank and rear; but the commander of the
Confederate forces evidently did not share in the apprehension
manifested by the warning signals as to the danger which
immediately threatened us.

When the battle began in the morning my command was on
the Confederate right; but at the end of the morning's fight,
when the fatal halt was called, my immediate division was on the
Confederate left. General Early in his report, now published,
states that I had gotten on the left with my division. He did not
seem to understand how we reached the left, when we were on
the right at the opening of the morning fight. Had

General Early been there when our ringing rifles were
sounding a reveille to Sheridan's sleeping braves, had he seen
Evans and Kershaw as I saw them, sweeping with the scattering
fury of a whirlwind down the Union intrenchments, and following
the flying Federals far beyond our extreme left, he would have
known exactly how we got there. From the Confederate right to
the Confederate left we had passed in swift pursuit of the routed
enemy. Across the whole length of the Confederate front these
divisions had swept, trying to catch Sheridan's panic-stricken
men, and they did catch a great many of them.

When the long hours of dallying with the Sixth [Union] Corps
had passed, and our afternoon alignment was made, there was a
long gap, with scarcely a vedette, to guard it between my right
and the main Confederate line. The flapping flags from the
mountain and the messages from Rosser were burdened with
warnings that the rallied Union infantry and heavy bodies of
cavalry were already in front of the gap and threatening both
flank and rear. With that fearful gap in the line, and the appalling
conditions which our long delay had invited, every Confederate
commander of our left wing foresaw the crash which speedily
came. One after another of my staff was directed to ride with all
speed to General Early and apprise him of the hazardous
situation. Receiving no satisfactory answer, I myself finally rode
to headquarters to urge that he reënforce the left and fill the gap,
which would prove a veritable deathtrap if left open many
minutes longer; or else that he concentrate his entire force for
desperate defence or immediate withdrawal. He instructed me to
stretch out the already weak lines and take a battery of guns to
the left. I rode back at a furious gallop to execute these most
unpromising movements. It was too late. The last chance had
passed of saving the army from the

doom which had been threatened for hours. Major Kirkpatrick
had started with his guns, rushing across the plain to the
crumbling Confederate lines like fire-engines tearing through
streets in the vain effort to save a building already wrapped in
flames and tumbling to the ground. I reached my command only
in time to find the unresisted columns of Sheridan rushing through
this gap, and, worse still, to find Clement A. Evans, whom I left
in command, almost completely surrounded by literally
overwhelming numbers; but he was handling the men with great
skill, and fighting in almost every direction with characteristic
coolness. It required countercharges of the most daring
character to prevent the utter destruction of the command and
effect its withdrawal. At the same instant additional Union
forces, which had penetrated through the vacant space, were
assailing our main line on the flank and rolling it up like a scroll.
Regiment after regiment, brigade after brigade, in rapid
succession was crushed, and, like hard clods of clay under a
pelting rain, the superb commands crumbled to pieces. The sun
was sinking, but the spasmodic battle still raged. Wrapped in
clouds of smoke and gathering darkness, the overpowered
Confederates stubbornly yielded before the advancing Federals.

There was no yelling on the one side, nor huzzahs on the
other. The gleaming blazes from hot muzzles made the murky
twilight lurid. The line of light from Confederate guns grew
shorter and resistance fainter. The steady roll of musketry,
punctuated now and then by peals of thunder from retreating or
advancing batteries, suddenly ceased; and resistance ended as
the last organized regiment of Early's literally overwhelmed army
broke and fled in the darkness. As the tumult of battle died
away, there came from the north side of the plain a dull, heavy
swelling sound like the roaring of a distant cyclone, the omen of
additional disaster. It was

unmistakable. Sheridan's horsemen were riding furiously across
the open fields of grass to intercept the Confederates before
they crossed Cedar Creek. Many were cut off and captured. As
the sullen roar from horses' hoofs beating the soft turf of the
plain told of the near approach of the cavalry, all effort at orderly
retreat was abandoned. The only possibility of saving the rear
regiments was in unrestrained flight--every man for himself.
Mounted officers gathered here and there squads of brave men
who poured volleys into the advancing lines of blue; but it was
too late to make effective resistance.

In the dim starlight, after crossing the creek, I gathered around
me a small force representing nearly every command in Early's
army, intending to check, if possible, the further pursuit, or at
least to delay it long enough to enable the shattered and rapidly
retreating fragments to escape. The brave fellows responded to
my call and formed a line across the pike. The effort was utterly
fruitless, however, and resulted only in hair-breadth escapes and
unexampled experiences.

It has never been settled whether, in escaping from the British
dragoons under Tryon, General Israel Putnam rode or rolled or
slid down the precipice at Horse Neck in 1779; but whichever
method of escape he adopted, I can "go him two better," as the
sportsmen say, for I did all three at Cedar Creek, eighty-five
years later, in escaping from American dragoons under Philip
Sheridan. At the point where I attempted to make a stand at
night, the pike ran immediately on the edge of one of those
abrupt and rugged limestone cliffs down which it was supposed
not even a rabbit could plunge without breaking his neck; and I
proved it to be nearly true. One end of my short line of gray-jackets
rested on the pike at this forbidding precipice. I had
scarcely gotten my men in position when I discovered that
Sheridan's dragoons

had crossed the creek higher up, and that I was
surrounded by them on three sides, while on the
other was this breakneck escarpment. These enterprising
horsemen in search of their game had located my
little band, and at the sound of the bugle they came in
headlong charge. Only one volley from my men and the
Federal cavalry were upon them. Realizing that our
capture was imminent, I shouted to my men to escape,
if possible, in the darkness. One minute more and I
should have had a Yankee carbine at my head, inviting
my surrender. The alternatives were the precipice or
Yankee prison. There was no time to debate the question,
not a moment. Wheeling my horse to the dismal
brink, I drove my spurs into his flanks, and he plunged
downward and tumbled headlong in one direction, sending
me in another. How I reached the bottom of that
abyss I shall never know; for I was rendered temporarily
unconscious. Strangely enough, I was only stunned,
and in no way seriously hurt. My horse, too, though
bruised, was not disabled. For a moment I thought
he was dead, for he lay motionless and prone at full
length. However, he promptly responded to my call
and rose to his feet; and although the bare places on his
head and hips showed that he had been hurt, he was
ready without a groan to bear me again in any direction
I might wish to go. The question was, which way to go.
I was alone in that dark wooded glen--that is, my faithful
horse was the only comrade and friend near enough
to aid me. I was safe enough from discovery, although
so near the pike that the rumble of wheels and even the
orders of the Union officers were at times quite audible.
It was, perhaps, an hour or more after nightfall, and yet
the vanguard of Sheridan's army had not halted. Considerable
numbers of them were now between me and the
retreating Confederates. The greater part of the country
on each side of the pike, however, was open, and I was

fairly familiar with it all. There was no serious difficulty, therefore,
in
passing around the Union forces, who soon went into camp for
the night. Lonely, thoughtful, and sad,--sadder and more
thoughtful, if possible, on this nineteenth night of October than on
the corresponding night of the previous month at Winchester,--I
rode through open fields, now and then finding squads of
Confederates avoiding the pike to escape capture, and
occasionally a solitary soldier as lonely, if not as sad and
thoughtful, as I.

Thus ended the day which had witnessed a most brilliant
victory converted into one of the most complete and ruinous
routs of the entire war. It makes one dizzy to think of such a
headlong descent from the Elysium of triumph to the Erebus
of complete collapse.

CHAPTER XXV

THE FATAL HALT AT CEDAR CREEK

Analysis of the great mistake--Marshalling of testimony--Documentary
proof of the error--Early's "glory enough for one day" theory--What
eye-witnesses say--The defence of the Confederate soldier--A complete
vindication.

The sun in his circuit shines on few lovelier landscapes than
that of Cedar Creek in the Valley of Virginia, which was the
wrestling-ground of the two armies on October 19, 1864; and no
day in the great war's calendar, nor in the chronicles of any
other war, so far as my knowledge extends, was filled with such
great surprises--so much of the unexpected to both armies.
Other days during our war witnessed a brilliant triumph or a crushing
defeat for the one army or the other; but no other single day
saw each of the contending armies victorious and vanquished
on the same field and between the rising and setting of the same
sun. This nineteenth day of October, therefore, is, I believe,
the most unique day in the annals of war. It was Derby
day for fleet-footed racers on both sides; and the combined experiences
of the two combatants during this single day constitute the very
climax of the battle-born antitheses.

Thomas G. Jones, since governor of Alabama and now judge of the United
States Court, was then an aide on my staff, and sat on his horse at
my side when General

Early announced that we had had "glory enough for one day."
Boy soldier as he was then, he felt and expressed serious forebodings of the
disaster which was to follow in the wake of our great victory.

It was the anniversary of Yorktown and of the surrender of
Cornwallis to Washington, which virtually ended the struggle
of our fathers for liberty. After General Early consented to
adopt the plan which had been submitted and urged, members of
my staff and others reposing implicit faith in the fulfilment of
my predictions of a crushing defeat to Sheridan's army, confidently
anticipated that the next morning--October 19, 1864--would
witness for the Confederates, who were fighting for Southern
independence, a victory almost as signal as that won October
19, 1781, by the Rebels of the Revolution, who were fighting
for American independence. It is true that the conditions surrounding
the Confederate cause in the autumn of 1864
were far more desperate than those around the American
Revolutionists in the autumn of 1781. There were, however,
in our calculations, elements which still inspired hope.
If General Sheridan's army could be crushed and large
numbers captured, if it could be even disorganized
and dispersed, new life and vigor would be given to the still
defiant Confederacy. If the victory of the coming morning,
which seemed assured, should be followed by incessant blows and pressing
pursuit, it would open the
way to Washington, expose Northern States to immediate
invasion, magnify to Northern apprehension the
numbers and effectiveness of Early's army, compel
General Grant to send a larger force than Sheridan's
to meet us, enable General Lee at Petersburg to assume
the offensive and possibly arouse a strong peace sentiment
among the Northern masses. The complete surprise of the Union
army, and the resistless Confederate charges at dawn in flank,
front, and rear, vindicated the confident

predictions of victory. The disastrous Confederate defeat in the
evening made clear the mistake of hesitating and halting which
were a fatal abandonment of an essential part of the plan.

The story is short and simple, but sombre to the last degree.
To briefly recapitulate, orders from headquarters put an end in
the early morning to concentration and energetic pursuit, and,
therefore, to all hope of completing the great victory by capturing
or crushing the last intervening line in blue between us and the
Potomac. General Cullen A. Battle of Alabama was severely
wounded while leading his men with characteristic dash and
enthusiasm; but his brigade, one of the smallest, and also one of
the pluckiest, charged a battery supported by the Sixth Corps,
--the only one left,--and captured in open field six additional
pieces of artillery.1 What would have been the inevitable result of
the concentrated enfilade fire from all of Carter's guns tearing
through the whole length of that line, while the entire army of
Confederate infantry assailed it in front, flank, and rear?

History (so called) does not always give a true diagnosis of
the cases it deals with and attempts to analyze. It will be a long
time, I fear, before all the records of the great fight between the
States will tell, like sworn witnesses in the courts, "the truth, the
whole truth, and nothing but the truth."

I am writing reminiscences; but if they are to be of any value
they must also stand the test applied to witnesses in courts of
justice. The unexpected and unexplained absence of my official
report of Cedar Creek from the list of those published with
General Early's in the War Records makes clear my duty to
record in these

1 An old memorandum written by General Battle after he was carried
to hospital states that the number of guns captured by his brigade was
twelve instead of six.

reminiscences some statements which appear to me essential
to the truth of history.

Captain Jed Hotchkiss, of General Early's staff, has
fortunately left a Journal in which he recorded events as they
occurred day by day. In that Journal, which has been published
by the Government among official papers in the records of the
"War of the Rebellion" (First Series, Vol. XLIII, Part I, pp.
567-588), Captain Hotchkiss made at the time this memomrandum:
"Saturday, October 29th . . . . . A contention between Generals
Gordon and Early about the battle of Cedar Creek," etc.
There were a number of strongly controverted points between
us; but the only one in which the whole country is concerned,
involving as it does the character of Southern soldiery, the only
one which I feel compelled to notice in this book, is the question
as to the responsibility for the disaster at Cedar Creek after the
signal victory had been won. Two reasons have been given for
this revulsion, and both have evoked no little discussion. If
General Sheridan and his friends had been consulted, they
doubtless would have added a third, namely, his arrival on the
field. This, however, was not considered by General Early and
myself, and it did not disturb the harmony of our counsels. We
had widely differing explanations for the disaster, but neither of us
suggested General Sheridan's arrival as the cause. General Early
insisted, and so stated in his now published report, that the "bad
conduct" of his own men caused the astounding disaster; while I
was convinced that it was due solely to the unfortunate halting
and delay after the morning victory. I insisted then, and still insist,
that our men deserved only instinted praise. I believed then, and I
believe now, that neither General Sheridan nor any other
commander could have prevented the complete destruction of his
infantry if in the early hours of the morning we had concentrated
our fire

and assaults upon his only remaining corps. The situation was
this: two thirds of Sheridan's army had been shivered by blows
delivered in flank and rear. If, therefore, Early's entire army,
triumphant, unhurt, and exhilarated, had been instantly hurled
against that solitary corps in accordance with the general plan of
the battle, it is certain that there would not have been left in it an
organized company; and many hours before General Sheridan
made his ride, the last nucleus around which he could possibly
have rallied his shattered and flying forces would have been
destroyed.

If my official report of the battle of Cedar Creek had been
published with General Early's, it would perhaps not be
necessary for me to speak of the "contention" mentioned by
Captain Hotchkiss in his Journal, which I have recently seen for
the first time. Justice to others, however, to the living and the
dead, demands that I now make record in this book of some
facts connected with that "contention," and that I send to
posterity this record in connection with his report.

Thousands of living men and hundreds of thousands of their
descendants, and of the descendants of those who fell heroically
fighting under the Southern flag, have a profound, a measureless
interest in the final settlement of that controverted point of
which I am now to speak from personal knowledge, and from
the testimony of scores of witnesses who participated in the
battle and whose military acumen and experience give special
weight to their words.

It is due to General Early to say that his physical strength was
not sufficient to enable him to ascend Massanutten Mountain
and survey the field from that lofty peak. He had not, therefore,
the opportunity to take in the tremendous possibilities which that
view revealed. He had not been permitted to stand upon that
summit and trace with his own eye

the inviting lines for the Confederate night march; to see for
himself, in the conditions immediately before him, the sure
prophecy of Confederate victory, and to have
his brain set on fire by clearly perceiving that the movement, if
adopted and executed with vigor and
pressed to the end, must inevitably result in bringing to
Sheridan's army, in quick succession, complete surprise,
universal dismay, boundless panic, and finally rout,
capture, or annihilation. Again, General Early was not on that
portion of the field which was struck by the Confederate cyclone
at dawn; nor did he witness its destructive sweep through
Sheridan's camps and along his breastworks, leaving in its wide
track not a Federal soldier with arms in his hands. Major Hunter,
my chief of staff, rode back to meet General Early, with
instructions to give him my compliments and inform him that two
thirds of Sheridan's army were routed and
nearly all his artillery captured, while our troops had suffered no
serious loss. The Confederate commander was naturally elated,
and felt that we had had "glory enough for one day." He,
therefore, halted. The pressing question is, Was that halt fatal?
Was it responsible for the afternoon disaster, or was the "bad
conduct" of the men responsible? This question was the cause
of the "contention" of which Captain Hotchkiss made record,
and which, in view of the absence of my report from the
published records, and under the inexorable demands of duty to
living and dead comrades, I am bound to answer in perfect
fairness but also with truth and candor.

General Sheridan, in his official report of Cedar Creek,1
speaking of the "heavy turning column" (my command)
which crossed the river at Bowman's Ford, describes the
assault as "striking Crook, who held the left of our
line in flank and rear, so unexpectedly and forcibly as

to drive in his outposts, invade his camp, and turn his
position . . . . . This was followed by a direct attack upon our front [this was
Kershaw's assault], and the result was that the whole army was
driven back in confusion to a point about one mile and a half
north of Middletown, a very large portion of the infantry not even
preserving a company organization." He adds that about nine
o'clock, "on reaching Mill Creek, half a mile south of
Winchester, the head of the fugitives appeared in sight, trains
and men coming to the rear with appalling rapidity." He left
officers to do what they could "in stemming the torrent of
fugitives." This frank statement of General Sheridan makes plain
the truth that the exultant Confederates were halted at the time
when the "whole army [Union] had been driven back in
confusion," when there was not left in a large portion of Union
infantry "a company organization," and when "the torrent of
fugitives" had gone to the rear with such "appalling rapidity" as
to have reached Mill Creek, eight or ten miles away, by nine
o'clock in the morning. I submit that I might rest the whole of my
"contention" on these remarkable admissions of General
Sheridan as to the condition of his army when the fatal
Confederate halt was ordered.

General Sheridan also states that the attack in flank and rear,
which was made by my troops, was followed by one in front.
This latter was promptly and superbly made by Kershaw.
General Sheridan's statement clearly shows that the assault of
my command preceded, but was promptly followed by,
Kershaw's. Captain Hotchkiss of General Early's staff records
in his Journal, penned at the time, precisely the same facts (Vol.
XLIII, p. 581). These Official Records from both sides render it
unnecessary for me to make any reply whatever to General
Early's intimation in his report that I was a little late in making
my attack at Cedar Creek. A vast array of testimony

(Federal and Confederate) is at hand showing
conclusively that General Early was mistaken in supposing that
my command was late on that October morning.

Colonel Thomas H. Carter, General Early's chief of artillery
on this field, and now the honored proctor of the University of
Virginia, writes me from the university: "I confirm with
emphasis your opinion that General Early made a fatal mistake
in stopping the pursuit of the enemy, with the Sixth Corps retiring
before artillery alone and the other two corps in full and
disorganized flight at nine o'clock in the morning. Captain
Southall's letter will show plainly my views as expressed to
General Early in his presence."

Captain S. V. Southall, now of Charlottesville, Virginia, in the
letter to which Colonel Carter refers, in speaking of General
Early at the moment he received the news of the morning
victory, says: "His face became radiant with joy, and in his
gladness he exclaimed,'The sun of Middletown! The sun of
Middletown!' " The last of Sheridan's army in its retreat had then
reached the borders of Middletown. Captain Southall then
reminds Colonel Carter of his suggesting to General Early the
propriety of advancing, and says: "Your suggestion looking to
the completion of our victory was ignored. Things remained in
this way for hours, during which time Sheridan returned."
Colonel Carter, in his own letter on that point, says: "At a later
interview with General Early, I explained that the troops were
eager to go ahead, and I had been questioned all along the line to
know the cause of the delay . . . . . Of course, Sheridan, finding his
cavalry corps intact and equal in number to our army, and the
Sixth Corps unbroken, though demoralized, was right to assume
the offensive, and his ride on the black horse will go down in
history and romance as a tribute to his military fame.
Nevertheless,

if we had done our proper part in pursuit, his arrival would have
accomplished nothing. Every practical fighting man in our war
knows that troops scattered and panic-stricken cannot be rallied
in the face of hot and vigorous pursuit."

Major R. W. Hunter, who was all day actively participating in
the battle, speaking of the destruction of two thirds of the Union
army by that flank and rear attack, says in his written statement
of facts: "Neither the famous Macedonian phalanx, nor
Caesar's Tenth Legion, nor the Old Guard of Napoleon, nor
Wellington's hollow squares, which saved him at Waterloo, nor
any possible organization of troops, could have withstood the
combined assault of infantry, artillery, and cavalry that it was in
our power to have made upon the Sixth Corps on that eventful
morning after the complete rout of the Eighth and Nineteenth
Corps. Why was not that concentrated assault made?"

Shortly after the battle of Cedar Creek the newspapers were
filled with descriptions of the morning victory and evening rout.
That "contention" between General Early and myself was
inaugurated by his intimation, in the presence of other officers,
that I had inspired some of those accounts. Notwithstanding my
appreciation of General Early's high qualities, and in spite of the
official courtesy due him as my superior officer (which, I
believe, was never ignored), I could not do less than indignantly
resent the injustice of such an intimation. At the same time, my
sense of duty to the army and regard for truth compelled me
candidly to say, and I did say, that the facts had been truly stated
as to our unfortunate halt and fatal delay.

General Clement A. Evans, whose superb record as a soldier
and exalted character as a man and minister of the gospel entitle
any statement from him to unquestioning belief, was a division
commander in the moving

attack which swept away Sheridan's two corps. General Evans is
now at the head of the Board of Pardons of the State of Georgia,
and, learning that I was writing of Cedar Creek, sent me a strong
letter, from which I make a brief quotation. His statements fully
corroborate those made at the time in the newspaper reports. For
reasons which will be readily understood, I omit from the
quotation the words used by General Evans as to the credit for the
morning victory and the responsibility for the evening disaster, and
give only this concluding clause: "And the Cedar Creek disaster
was caused by the halt which you did not order and which I know
you opposed."

General Thomas L. Rosser, who commanded the
Confederate cavalry on the field, says: "The sun never rose on
a more glorious victory and never set on a more inglorious
defeat. Had . . . . . the fight continued . . . . . as it was so gloriously
begun, Sheridan's ride of twenty miles away would never have
been sung," etc.

General Gabriel C. Wharton, now of Radford, Virginia, who
commanded a division of General Early's army at Cedar Creek,
speaking of some movements by our troops just after the rout of
Sheridan's two corps, says: "I supposed we were arranging for
a general movement to the front, and expected every minute
orders to advance; but no orders came, and there we stood--no
enemy in our front for hours, except some troops moving about
in the woodland on a hill nearly a mile in our front." He adds: "I
have never been able to understand why General Early did not
advance, or why he remained in line for four or five hours after
the brilliant victory of the morning."

Captain Hotchkiss, in his contribution to the recently published
"Confederate Military History" (Vol. III, p. 509), after paying to
his old chief, General Early, the compliments which he richly
deserved as an "able

strategist, most skilful commander, and one of the bravest of the
brave," nevertheless characterizes the fatal halt at Cedar Creek
as "this inexcusable delay."

I also present another item of testimony, which was
given under most interesting circumstances. During
the winter which followed this battle there occurred, in
connection with this Valley campaign, one of the most
thrilling incidents of the entire war. It exhibited as
much daring and dash as the famous scouting expedition
of the brave Federal squad who came into Georgia and
scouted in rear of our army, and then, seizing an engine
on the Western and Atlantic Railroad, fled upon it back
toward Chattanooga and the Union lines. The daring
adventure of which I now speak was, however, far more
successful than this bold scouting in Georgia. While
northern Virginia and Maryland were in the icy embrace
of midwinter, a small squad of plucky Confederates from
Captain McNeill's Partisan Rangers rode at
night into Cumberland, Maryland, where 5000 armed
men of the Union army were stationed. These audacious
young Confederates eluded the Union guards,
located the headquarters of Major-Generals Crook and
Kelley, captured them in their beds, and brought them,
as prisoners of war mounted on their own horses, safely
into Confederate lines. General Crook was the distinguished
commander of the Union troops whose flank
and rear my command had struck at dawn on Cedar
Creek. When he was brought to headquarters as prisoner,
General Early interviewed him in reference to that
battle. Captain Hotchkiss states that in the interview
General Crook represented the Sixth Corps, on the morning
of the 19th of October at Cedar Creek, as almost as
"badly damaged" as the other corps, and in no condition
to resist attack.1

marvellous battle to know that General Early himself realized
later the fatal mistake of the halt at Cedar Creek, and gave an
indicative caution to his faithful staff officer, who was leaving
with a sketch of Cedar Creek for General Lee. Captain
Hotchkiss says: "General Early told me not to tell General Lee
that we ought to have advanced in the morning at Middletown,
for, said he,'we ought to have done so.' " 1

Anything more on this point would be superfluous. I should not
have felt it necessary to produce these proofs as to the
responsibility of the halting and delay but for the fact that they
bear directly and cogently upon the other infinitely more
important inquiry, "Was the 'bad conduct' of the troops
wholly
or partially, directly or remotely, responsible for that evening
disaster?" Posterity may not trouble itself much about the halting
and hesitation at Cedar Creek; but posterity--undoubtedly
Confederate posterity--will be profoundly interested in this
inquiry: "Did Confederate officers and men abandon their posts
of duty and danger to plunder the captured camps and thus
convert one of the most brilliant of victories into a most
disastrous defeat and utter rout?"

This charge so directly, so vitally concerns the reputation, the
honor, the character of Southern soldiers (it concerns all
American soldiers, for these men were Americans of purest
blood) as to demand the most exhaustive examination. Let the
fiercest search-light of historical scrutiny be turned upon those
men. Let the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth go
to posterity. With the purpose of contributing to this end, I shall
incorporate, not in foot-notes but in the body of this chapter, all
the important and trustworthy evidence at my command bearing
upon this question,

which is the gravest that has ever been asked or could be asked
concerning Confederate soldiers. I shall give proofs which
cannot be called in question, in extracts from the official reports
and written statements of all the prominent Confederate actors
in that battle, so far as I can possibly procure them.

To begin with, I quote fully and carefully from General
Early's reports to General Lee, which I did not see
until they were published by the Government in the
records of the "War of the Rebellion." In his despatch,
dated October 20, 1864, speaking of his troops, General
Early says: "But for their bad conduct I should have
defeated Sheridan's whole force."1 In his more formal
report of October 21st, speaking of an order said to have
been sent to Kershaw and Gordon to advance, he says:
"They stated in reply that . . . . . their ranks were so
depleted by the number of men who had stopped in the
camps to plunder that they could not advance."
2 In
the same report on the same page, he says: "So many of
our men had stopped in camp to plunder (in which I am
sorry to say that officers participated)," etc. Again, in
another connection, he says: "We had within our grasp
a glorious victory, and lost it by the uncontrollable
propensity to plunder, in the first place, and the subsequent
panic, . . . . . which was without sufficient cause," etc.
In another connection, speaking of the efforts to guard
against plundering, he says: "The truth is, we have few
field and company officers worth anything," etc. Before
closing his report he again says: "But the victory already
gained was lost by the subsequent bad conduct of the
troops."

Before introducing the array of witnesses and the
incontrovertible facts which overwhelmingly vindicate these
chivalrous and self-sacrificing men, I wish to say,

as a matter of simple justice to General Early, that he was
misled. His place was at the front, and after he came upon the
field he was there--as he always was, when duty called him. No
soldier or citizen was braver or more loyally devoted to our
cause than Jubal A. Early; but, as General Lee once said of
another, he was "very pertinacious of his opinions," and when
once formed he rarely abandoned them. He fought against
secession and for the Union until it was broken. He tied his faith
to the Confederacy and fought for that while it lived, and he did
not abandon its cause until both the Confederacy and himself
were dead. He had been led to believe that his men at Cedar
Creek had left their places in line to gather the tempting débris
from the Federal wreck, and he steadfastly stood by this
statement. Little wonder, then, that there should be the
"contention" which Captain Hotchkiss has noted.

General Kershaw is dead, but were he living he would unite
with me, as shown by the reports of his officers, in the statement
that no such order ever reached us as the one which General
Early sent. No reply was ever returned by General Kershaw or
myself to the effect that we could not advance. The truth is we
were not only urgently anxious to advance, but were astounded
at any halt whatever. Our troops were not absent. They were
there in line, eager to advance, as will appear from the
unanswerable proofs submitted. General Evans, who
commanded my division while I commanded the Second Corps
in the morning victory, says: "When you congratulated me on the
field immediately after our great victory . . . . . I was so impressed
by your remarks as to be convinced that we would at once
pursue our advantage . . . . . I had small details sent over the
ground we had traversed in order to bring up every man who
had fallen out for any cause except for wounds . . . . . When the
attack [afternoon] came from the enemy my

command was not straggling and plundering . . . . . I wish I could
see my men fully vindicated as to their conduct in this battle."

General Cullen A. Battle says: "I saw no plundering at Cedar
Creek, not even a straggler. My troops were in the best possible
condition." In another statement he says: "I never saw troops
behave better than ours did at Cedar Creek."

Major-General Wharton, who was in the best possible position
to know if there was any straggling or plundering, uses these
words: "The report of the soldiers straggling and pillaging the
enemy's camps is not correct. . . . . I had a pretty fair view of a large part of the field over
which you had driven the enemy. It is true that there were
parties passing over the field and perhaps pillaging, but most of
them were citizens, teamsters and persons attached to the
quartermaster's and other departments, and perhaps a few
soldiers who had taken the wounded to the rear. No, general;
the disaster was not due to the soldiers leaving their commands
and pillaging."

Of all the reports of Cedar Creek which have been published
in the War Records, not one except General Early's alone
remotely hints at plundering as the cause of that unprecedented
revulsion after the morning victory. Only two of those reports
refer to the matter in any way whatever, and in both the
language completely exonerates these devoted men. General
Bryan Grimes, who was promoted to command of Ramseur's
division, says: "Up to the hour of 4 P.M. the troops of this
division, both officers and men, with a few exceptions, behaved
most admirably and were kept well in hand, but little plundering
and only a few shirking duty." He adds: "Major Whiting,
inspector, rendered signal service by preventing all straggling
and plundering."1

John R. Winston, in his report (same vol., p. 608), says: "The
men went through a camp just as it was deserted, with hats,
boots, blankets, tents, and such things as tempt our soldiers
scattered over it, and after diligent inquiry I heard of but one
man who even stopped to pick up a thing. He got a hat, and has
charges preferred against him." He refers with pride to the
"splendid conduct of these troops," etc.

That gallant soldier J. M. Goggin, who commanded Conner's
brigade of Kershaw's division, in his official report, says: "Up to
this time" [the afternoon assault by Sheridan] "both men and
officers had obeyed with commendable cheerfulness and
alacrity all orders given them . . . . . I cannot forbear giving both
officers and men that praise which is so justly their due for the
noble display of all the admirable and true qualities of the soldier
up to the time the retreat was ordered; and no one who
witnessed the advance of the brigade that day against different
positions of the enemy will hesitate to bestow upon it their [his]
unqualified admiration" (p. 594).

While almost any one of these pointed and just testimonials
would be a sufficient vindication of these self-immolating
veterans, yet I must introduce here the most comprehensive
statement of all. It was written by the Rev. A. C. Hopkins, now
pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Charlestown, West
Virginia. He was, during the war, one of the leading
Confederate chaplains. In the different battles he was present,
mingling with the soldiers, caring for the wounded, and doing
admirable service in encouraging the men who were on the
fighting-line. No dangers deterred him; no sacrifices were too
great for him to make. Dr. Hopkins was one of those sterling
characters who esteemed honor and truth as of far greater
value than life itself. In the carefully prepared statement which
he wrote of Cedar

Creek, he says: "The writer was a'free-lance' that day, and all
over the field from rear to front, from the time Gordon struck
Crook's lines at daybreak till the afternoon. He was sometimes
with our lines and sometimes with the wounded, over the field
and through the Yankee camps . . . . . It is true that many men
straggled and plundered; but they were men who in large
numbers had been wounded in the summer's campaign, who had
come up to the army for medical examination, and who came
like a division down the pike behind Wharton, and soon scattered
over the field and camps and helped themselves. They were
soldiers more or less disabled, and not on duty. This body I
myself saw as they came on the battle-field and scattered. They
were not men with guns. But there can be no doubt that General
Early mistook them for men who had fallen out of ranks." In
speaking of that "contention" between General Early and
myself which was evoked by this serious misapprehension as to
the "bad conduct" of our brave men, Dr. Hopkins says: "Nearly
all the inspectors who sent reports for 19th October to General
Gordon either gave the numbers of men carried up to the lines
during the day or vindicated their commands from General
Early's imputation. And these inspectors' reports were
consolidated at General Gordon's headquarters and the
substance forwarded in his report to General Early.
Unfortunately, no inspectors' reports appear among the
published records, and they [the records] contain not one word
from General Gordon on this battle."

It seems to me unnecessary to lengthen this chapter by
additional evidence or by any argument. The proofs already
adduced compass the irrefutable vindication of the winners of
the morning victory at Cedar Creek. Many of the dead
commanders left on record their testimony; and it is true, I
think, that every living Confederate

officer who commanded at Cedar Creek a corps, or
division, or brigade, or regiment, or company, would testify that
his men fought with unabated ardor, and did not abandon their
places in line to plunder the captured camps. It is truly
marvellous, therefore, that the statement that their "bad conduct"
caused the disastrous reverse has gone into books and is treated
as history in all sections of the country. Even ex-President
Jefferson Davis, the last man on earth who would knowingly do
Confederate soldiers an injustice, was totally misled by General
Early's statement.

If my official report of the battle of Cedar Creek had been
forwarded to General Lee and published in the War Records, I
might be pardoned by my comrades and their children if I did not
write as I am now writing in vindication of the men who fought
so superbly and exhibited such marked self-denial in that most
unique of battles. Not for my sake, but for theirs, I deeply regret
the absence of my report from those records. It is only since this
book was begun that my attention was called to this fact. It
would seem that my report never reached General Lee.
Otherwise it would have been among his papers, and assuredly
have found its place in the volumes issued by the Government.
General Lee, however, did not agree with his lieutenant
commanding in the Valley as to the kind of metal these men
were made of. On September 27th he wrote General Early: "I
have such confidence in the men and officers that I am sure all
will unite in defence of the country."1 These men were not
strangers to General Lee. He knew them. He had seen them in
the past years of the war, performing deeds of valor and
exercising a self-denial the simple record of which would rival
the legends of the romantic era of chivalry. They had not
changed, except to grow, if possible, into a more self-sacrificing
manhood as the demands

upon them became more exacting. Whatever they had
been in the battles around Richmond, at Fredericksburg, at
Chancellorsville, at Gettysburg, at Cold Harbor, in the
Wilderness, and in the great countercharge at Spottsylvania,
they were the same at Cedar Creek. The men who were in the
captured camps were not the soldiers who fought the morning
battle and won the morning victory. The "plunderers," if such
they may be called, were not the fiery South Carolinians who,
under Kershaw, had so fearlessly and fiercely stormed and
carried the Union breastworks at dawn. They were not the
steadfast Virginians who, under Wharton, had rushed into the
combat, adding fresh momentum to the resistless Confederate
charge. They were not the men under my command, the Second
Corps, which Jackson had immortalized and which had helped to
immortalize him. They were not the men who, under Evans, and
Ramseur, and Grimes, and Battle, and Pegram, had before
daybreak plunged into the cold water to their waists or armpits,
and with drenched bodies and water-soaked uniforms had
warmed themselves in the hot furnace of battle. These men at
Cedar Creek were heroes, descended from heroic sires, inspired
by heroic women, trained to self-denial and self-sacrifice
through four years of the most heroic of wars, and battling
through cold and heat and hunger against heroic Americans.
Were these the men to abandon their places in front to plunder
in the rear? Who, then, were the men in the captured camps
who were reported to General Early? They were men without
arms, the partially disabled, whom the army surgeons had
pronounced scarcely strong enough for the long and rough night
march and the strenuous work of the battle. These half-sick and
disabled men had come along the smooth, open pike at their
leisure, when they learned of the great victory. They came
thinking it no robbery to supply themselves with shoes and
trousers

and overcoats and blankets and "grub" from the vast
accumulations purchased that morning by the toil and blood of
their able-bodied comrades--from the stores which the richly
provided Federals, in their unceremonious departure, had
neglected to take away.

Many years have passed since the Confederate commander
at Cedar Creek was misled and induced to place on record his
belief as to the bad conduct of his men--a belief, I repeat, fixed in
his mind by misinformation and grounded on total
misapprehension. But many years had also passed after the
battle of Cold Harbor before the exculpation of the brave men
of the Union army was effected by General Horace Porter in
his book, "Campaigning with Grant." The refutation of that
wrong, although long delayed, will be none the less appreciated
by Union veterans and by all their descendants. It is not too late,
I trust, for the truth, as now revealed, to
vindicate these Confederates. Appeals,
pathetic and earnest, have been made to me for years, the
burden of which has been: "I want you, before you
die, to do justice to the men who fought at Cedar Creek." The
stoniest heart would be moved by such
appeals. They would stir the sensibilities of any man who saw
those dauntless veterans on that field or who fought and
suffered with them in the Confederate army. I had a right,
however, to suppose that the great War Records would include
my report and the inspectors'
reports, every one of which, I believe, without an exception,
was a vindication of that little army whose valor
and scrupulous, soldierly bearing has never been surpassed. I
protested at the time against the injustice done them. Hence the
"contention" recorded by Captain Hotchkiss. I left the
substance of that protest in permanent form, but that is lost; and
now I esteem it one of the most imperative duties devolving
upon me to do all in my power to guide the future historian to a

clear apprehension of the truth in regard to the chivalrous
character and conduct of these loyal men. Although the unparalleled
wrong which, through
misapprehension, was done them may have already
crystallized in war records and so-called histories, yet I
shall live and die in the confident hope that the irrefutable
proofs herein adduced, which have never before been
grouped and marshalled, will stand as their complete
though tardy vindication.

No man, I think, has a higher or more just appreciation than
myself of our Confederate leaders; but the brilliant victories won
by our arms will be found, in their last analyses, to be in a large
measure due to the strong individuality, the deep-seated
convictions, the moral stamina, the martial instinct, and the
personal prowess of our private soldiers; and in no divisions of
Lee's army were these characteristics more completely
developed than in those which fought at Cedar Creek.

CHAPTER XXVI

THE LAST WINTER OF THE WAR

Frequent skirmishes follow Cedar Creek--Neither commander anxious for a
general engagement--Desolation in the Valley--A fated family--
Transferred to Petersburg--A gloomy Christmas--All troops on reduced
rations--Summoned to Lee's headquarters--Consideration of the dire straits
of the army--Three possible courses.

THE Cedar Creek catastrophe did not wholly dispirit Early's
army nor greatly increase the aggressive energy of Sheridan's. It
was the last of the great conflicts in the historic Valley which for
four years had been torn and blood-stained by almost incessant
battle. Following on Cedar Creek were frequent skirmishes,
some sharp tilts with Sheridan's cavalry, a number of captures
and losses of guns and wagons by both sides, and an amount of
marching--often twenty to twenty-five miles a day--that sorely
taxed the bruised and poorly shod feet of the still cheerful
Confederates. On November 16th Captain Hotchkiss made this
memorandum in his Journal: "Sent a document to Colonel
Boteler showing that to this date we had marched, since the
opening of the campaign, sixteen hundred and seventy miles, and
had seventy-five battles and skirmishes." All of the encounters
which followed Cedar Creek, however, would not have equalled
in casualties a second-rate battle; but they served to emphasize
the fact that neither commander was disposed to bring the other
to a general

engagement. Evidently the grievous castigation which each
received at Cedar Creek had left him in the sad plight of the
Irishman who, recovering from an attack of grip, declared that it
was the worst disease he ever had, for it kept him sick four
months after he got well.

During this period of Union and Confederate convalescence I
was transferred, by General Lee's orders, to the lines of defence
around the beleagured Confederate capital and its sympathizing
sister city, Petersburg. My command, the Second Corps,
consisted of the divisions of Evans, Grimes, and Pegram.
Before dawn on December 8th the long trains were bearing two
divisions of my command up the western slope of the Blue
Ridge range which separated that hitherto enchanting Valley
from the undulating Piedmont region, which Thomas Jefferson
thought was some day to become the most populous portion of
our country because so richly endowed by nature. As I stood on
the back platform of the last car in the train and looked back
upon that stricken Valley, I could but contrast the aspect of
devastation and woe which it then presented, with the bounty
and peace in all its homes at the beginning of the war. Prior to
1862 it was, if possible, more beautiful and prosperous than the
famed blue-grass region of Kentucky. Before the blasting breath
of war swept over its rich meadows and fields of clover, they
had been filled with high-mettled horses, herds of fine cattle, and
flocks of sheep that rivalled England's best. These were all
gone. The great water-wheels which four years before had
driven the busy machinery of the mills were motionless--standing
and rotting, the silent vouchers of wholesale destruction. Heaps
of ashes, of half-melted iron axles and bent tires, were the
melancholy remains of burnt barns and farm-wagons and
implements of husbandry. Stone and brick chimneys, standing
alone in the midst of charred trees which once shaded the
porches of luxurious;

and happy homes, told of hostile torches which had left
these grim sentinels the only guards of those sacred spots. At
the close of this campaign of General Sheridan there was in that
entire fertile valley--the former American Arcadia--scarcely a
family that was not struggling for subsistence.

Among the excellent soldiers who participated in all that
Valley campaign was a Virginian, who is now Dr. Charles H.
Harris of Cedartown, Georgia. Dr. Harris's high character as a
man and his familiarity with the facts justify me in giving his
written account of the marvellous fatality which attended the
representatives of a Virginia family which contributed perhaps a
larger number of soldiers to the Confederate army than any
other in the Southern States. Two companies of the Sixtieth
Virginia Regiment were enlisted in and around Christiansburg,
which seems to have received its name from the family which
contributed eighteen of its members--brothers and cousins--to
those two Confederate companies. These eighteen kinsmen had
inherited their love of liberty from Revolutionary ancestors, and
had imbibed from the history and traditions of the Old Dominion
those lofty ideals of manhood of which her great people are so
justly proud. When, therefore, Virginia passed the solemn
ordinance of secession and cast her lot with that of her sister
States, these high-spirited young men enlisted in the Confederate
army. I recall nothing in history or even in romance which
equals in uniqueness and pathos the fate that befell them. The
decrees of that fate were uniform and inexorable. One by one,
these kinsmen fell in succeeding engagements. In every fight in
which the regiment was engaged one of this brave family was
numbered among the dead. As battle succeeded battle, and
each, with appalling regularity, claimed its victim, there ran
through company and regiment the unvarying question,

"Which one of the Christians was killed to-day, and which one
will go next?" Yet among the survivors, there was no wavering,
no effort to escape the doom which seemed surely awaiting each
in his turn. With a consecration truly sublime, each took his place
in line, ready for the sacrifice which duty demanded. For
seventeen successive engagements the gruesome record of
death had not varied. Then came Cedar Creek. Only one of the
gallant eighteen was left. His record for courage was
unsurpassed. A number of times he had been wounded, and in
the deadly hand-to-hand struggle at Cold Harbor he had been
pierced by a bayonet. Faithful to every duty, he had never
missed a fight. When the orders were issued for the night march
and the assault at dawn upon Sheridan's army, a deep fraternal
concern for this last survivor of the Christians was manifested by
all of his comrades. He was privately importuned to stay out of
the fight; or, if unwilling to remain in camp while his comrades
fought, he was urged to go home. Whether he yielded to these
warnings and entreaties will probably never be known. He was
seen by his comrades no more after that night march to Cedar
Creek. Many believe that he was loyal "even unto death," and
that he lies with the heroic and "unknown dead" who fell upon
that eventful field.

On reaching Petersburg it fell to my lot to hold the extreme
right of Lee's infantry. In front of this exposed wing was a
dense second growth of pines in which the daring scouts of both
armies often passed each other at night and found hiding-places
during their adventures. This forest also served to conceal the
movements of troops and made artillery practically useless.

Behind my position was the South Side Railroad--the last of the
long commercial arteries that had not been cut. General Grant
saw that to cut it was to starve Lee's army, and this meant the
death of the

Confederacy. His constant aim, therefore, was to seize and
sever it. My instructions were to prevent this at any cost. The
winter rains and snows and boggy roads were my helpers, and
no great battles ensued. There were, however, occasional
demonstrations of Grant's purpose, and he managed to keep us
alert night and day. It was a very lame railroad, even when left
without Federal interference. The iron rails were nearly worn
out, and there were no new ones to replace them. If the old and
badly maimed locomotives broke down, there were few or no
facilities for repairing them. So that if the supplies had been in
the far South this crippled road could not have brought them to
us; but, like the woman who said that she had "but one tooth
above and one below, but, thank God, they hit," we felicitated
ourselves that the shackling engines did fit the old track and
could help us somewhat. The commissary informed me, soon
after my troops were in their now position, that it was impossible
for the Government to supply us with more than half-rations, and
that even these were by no means certain. My different
commands, therefore, were at once instructed to send wagons
into the back country and remote settlements and purchase
everything obtainable that would sustain life.

"But suppose the teams and wagons are attacked and
captured by raiding-parties?"

"That chance must not deter you. Men are worth more than
mules and wagons, and we shall have no men unless we can
feed them," I replied.

This haphazard method of feeding the corps proved to be the
best then available; and later I had the satisfaction of receiving
General Lee's congratulations.

In one of General Grant's efforts to break through my lines,
General John Pegram, one of my most accomplished
commanders, fell, his blood reddening the white snow that
carpeted the field. He had just married Miss

Carey of Baltimore, one of the South's most beautiful and
accomplished women. Thus, within a few months, ravenous war
had claimed as victims two distinguished officers of my
command, almost immediately after their marriages. One of
these was Pegram of Virginia; the other was Lamar of Georgia.

Christmas (December 25, 1864) came while we were fighting
famine within and Grant without our lines. To meet either was a
serious problem. The Southern people from their earliest history
had observed Christmas as the great holiday season of the year.
It was the time of times, the longed-for period of universal and
innocent but almost boundless jollification among young and old.
In towns and on the plantations, purse-strings were loosened and
restraints relaxed--so relaxed that even the fun-loving negro
slaves were permitted to take some liberties with their masters,
to perpetrate practical jokes upon them, and before daylight to
storm "de white folks" houses with their merry calls: "Christmas
gift, master!" "Christmas gift, everybody!" The holiday, however,
on Hatcher's Run, near Petersburg, was joyless enough for the
most misanthropic. The one worn-out railroad running to the far
South could not bring to us half enough, necessary supplies; and
even if it could have transported Christmas boxes of good things,
the people at home were too depleted to send them. They had
already impoverished themselves to help their struggling
Government, and large areas of our territory had been made
desolate by the ravages of marching armies. The brave fellows
at the front, however, knew that their friends at home would
gladly send them the last pound of sugar in the pantry, and the
last turkey or chicken from the barnyard. So they facetiously
wished each other "Merry Christmas!" as they dined on their
wretched fare. There was no complaining, no repining, for they
know their exhausted country was doing all it could for them.

At my headquarters on that Christmas day there was unusual
merrymaking. Mrs. Gordon, on leaving home four years before,
had placed in her little army-trunk a small package of excellent
coffee, and had used it only on very special occasions--"to
celebrate," as she said, "our victories in the first years, and to
sustain us in defeat at the last." When I asked her, on the
morning of December 25, 1864, what we could do for a
Christmas celebration, she replied, "I can give you some of that
coffee which I brought from home." She could scarcely have
made an announcement more grateful to a hungry Confederate.
Coffee--genuine coffee! The aroma of it filled my official family
with epicurean enthusiasm before a cup was passed from the
boiling pot. If every man of us was not intoxicated by that
indulgence after long and enforced abstinence, the hilarity of the
party was misleading.

The left of my line rested on the west bank of Hatcher's Run.
A. P. Hill's corps was on the east side, with its right flank upon
the same stream. The commanding general directed that I build
a fort at the left of my line, and that A. P. Hill construct a similar
one near it on the opposite side of the run. General Hill became
ill after the order was received, and the construction of his fort
was not pressed. Indeed, the weather was so severe and the
roads so nearly impassable that there was no urgent necessity
for haste. General Lee, however, who habitually interested
himself in the smaller as well as the larger matters connected
with his army, did not forget these forts. Riding up to my
headquarters on a cold morning in January, 1865, he requested
me to ride with him to see the forts. As I mounted he said: "We
will go by General - - - - -'s quarters and ask him to accompany us, and
we will examine both forts." When this officer joined us (he was
temporarily in command of Hill's corps during the latter's
absence on sick-leave), General Lee at

once asked: "General Gordon, how are you getting along with
your fort?"

"Very well, sir. It is nearly finished."

Turning to the other officer, he asked: "Well, General - - - - -, how is
the work upon your fort progressing?"

This officer, who had felt no special responsibility for the fort,
as he was only temporarily in charge, was considerably
embarrassed by the general's pointed inquiry. He really had little
or no knowledge of the amount of work done upon it, but
ventured, after some hesitation, the reply: "I think the fort on my
side of the run is also about finished, sir."

Passing by my work after a short halt, we rode to the point at
which the A. P. Hill fort was to be located. No fort was there;
the work was scarcely begun. General Lee reined up his horse,
and looking first at the place where the fort was to be, and then
at the officer, he said: "General, you say the fort is about
finished?"

"I must have misunderstood my engineers, sir,"

"But you did not speak of your engineers. You spoke of the
fort as nearly completed."

This officer was riding a superb animal which General Lee
knew had been presented to his wife. His extreme
embarrassment made him unusually nervous, and his agitation
was imparted to the high-mettled animal, which became restless
and was not easily controlled. General Lee in the blandest
manner asked: "General, does n't Mrs. - - - - - ride that horse
occasionally?"

"Yes, sir," he replied.

"Well, general, you know that I am very much interested in
Mrs. - - - - -'s safety. I fear that horse is too nervous for her to ride
without danger, and I suggest that, in order to make him more
quiet, you ride him at least once every day to this fort."

This was his only reprimand; but no amount of severity on the
part of the commander-in-chief could have

been more trying to the sensibilities of the officer, who was an
admirable soldier, commanding General Lee's entire confidence.
The officer's mortification was so overwhelming that, on our
return, he rode considerably in the rear. General Lee observed
this, and could not resist the impulse to mitigate, as far as
possible, the pang caused by the rebuke that he had felt
compelled to administer. Halting his horse for a moment and
looking back at the officer in the rear, he called to him: "Ride up
and join us, general. I want to ask you and General
Gordon how long this war is to last." As we rode three abreast,
he continued: "I am led to ask this question because it has been
propounded to me. I received a letter this morning from my
brother, Captain Lee of the Confederate navy"--and he
stressed with peculiar emphasis the words "Confederate navy."
We had no navy except our marvellously destructive ironclads
and some
wild rovers of the sea. He continued: "You know these sailors
are great people for signs, and my brother says that the signs are
conflicting: that the girls are all getting married, and that is a sure sign of
war; but nearly all of the
babies are girls, and that is a sign of peace. I
want you gentlemen to tell me what reply I shall make to
Captain Lee of the Confederate navy." I do not recall our
answer; but the fort was speedily built.

The condition of our army was daily becoming more
desperate. Starvation, literal starvation, was doing its deadly
work. So depleted and poisoned was the blood of many of Lee's
men from insufficient and unsound food that a slight wound
which would probably not have
been reported at the beginning of the war would often cause
blood-poison, gangrene, and death. Yet the spirits
of these brave men seemed to rise as their condition grew more
desperate. The grim humor of the camp was waging incessant
warfare against despondency. They would not permit one
another to be disheartened at any

trial, or to complain at the burden or the chafing of any yoke
which duty imposed. It was a harrowing but not uncommon sight
to see those hungry men gather the wasted corn from under the
feet of half-fed horses, and wash and parch and eat it to satisfy
in some measure their craving for food. It was marvellous that
their spirits were not crushed, and still more marvellous that they
would extract fun from every phase of destitution. If one was
made sick at night by his supper of parched corn, his salutation
the next morning would be: "Hello, general; I am all right this
morning. I ate a lot of corn last night, and if you will have the
commissary issue me a good mess of hay for my breakfast, I'll
be ready for the next fight."

Another would advise his hungry companion to spend his
month's pay of Confederate money for a bottle of strong
astringent and draw in his stomach to the size of his ration.

It was during this doleful period that the suggestion to give
freedom to Southern slaves and arm them for Southern defence
became the pressing, vital problem at Richmond. It had been
seriously considered for a long period by the civil authorities, and
the opinions of certain officers in the field were at this time
formally solicited. General Lee strongly favored it, and so did
many members of Congress; but the bill as finally passed was
absurdly deficient in the most important provisions. It did not
make plain the fact that the slave's enlistment would at once
secure his freedom. Public sentiment was widely divided as to
the policy of such a step. In its favor was the stern fact,
universally recognized, that it was no longer possible to fill our
ranks except by converting slaves into soldiers; while the great
Government at Washington could enlist men not only from the
populous States of the Union, but from the teeming populations of
foreign countries.

Again, it was argued in favor of the proposition that the loyalty
and proven devotion of the Southern negroes to their owners
would make them serviceable and reliable as fighters, while their
inherited habits of obedience would make it easy to drill and
discipline them. The fidelity of the race during the past years of
the war, their refusal to strike for their freedom in any organized
movement that would involve the peace and safety of the
communities where they largely outnumbered the whites, and the
innumerable instances of individual devotion to masters and their
families, which have never been equalled in any servile race,
were all considered as arguments for the enlistment of slaves as
Confederate soldiers. Indeed, many of them who were with the
army as body-servants repeatedly risked their lives in following
their young masters and bringing them off the battle-field when
wounded or dead. These faithful servants at that time boasted of
being Confederates, and many of them meet now with the
veterans in their reunions, and, pointing to their Confederate
badges, relate with great satisfaction and pride their experiences
and services during the war. One of them, who attends nearly all
the reunions, can, after a lapse of nearly forty years, repeat from
memory the roll-call of the company to which his master
belonged. General Lee used to tell with decided relish of the old
negro (a cook of one of his officers) who called to see him at his
headquarters. He was shown into the general's presence, and,
pulling off his hat, he said, "General Lee, I been wanting to see
you a long time. I 'm a soldier."

"Ah? To what army do you belong--to the Union army or to
the Southern army?"

"Why, general, I ain't been shot 'cause I stays back whar de
generals stay."

Against the enlistment of negroes were urged the facts that
they were needed--were absolutely essential--on the
plantations to produce supplies for the armies and the people;
that even with their labor the country was exhausted, and
without it neither the armies nor the people at home could
survive; that the sentiment of the army itself was not prepared
for it, and that our condition was too critical for radical
experiments.

The meeting of the Southern commissioners--Mr.
Stephens, Mr. Hunter, and Judge Campbell, with Mr. Lincoln, at
Hampton Roads--had brought the warring sections no nearer to
peace. All things seemed now prophetic of the Confederacy's
certain and speedy death. And yet I must record in this
connection a truth of which I had constant evidence--that our
great commander, in the midst of all these depressing and
overwhelming trials, never lost for an hour his faith in the
devotion and unconquerable spirit of his army. And grandly did
that army vindicate the justice of his confidence. Although the
thought of speedy surrender or ultimate failure must have
occurred to officers and men, it did not find expression even in
the most confidential interviews. At least, not the remotest
suggestion of such possibility reached my ears from any source.
An intense loyalty to the cause seemed to imbue every man with
the conviction that nothing should be done or said which could
discourage his comrades or in any degree impair their wonderful
enthusiasm. The orders were necessarily stringent as to granting
furloughs, but desertions were astonishingly rare, although there
were no restrictions upon correspondence, and the mails were
loaded with letters telling the soldiers of the sufferings of those at
home whom they loved and who needed their support and care.
No one, however gifted with the

power of vigorous statement, could do justice to the manhood
displayed under such conditions. The commander appreciated
this exhibition of patience and endurance, and never lost an
opportunity to let his men know it.

In addition to the inspiration of devotion to him, every man of
them was supported by that extraordinary consecration resulting
from the conviction that he was fighting in defence of home and
the rights of his State. Hence their unfaltering faith in the justice
of the cause, their fortitude in extremest privations, their
readiness to stand shoeless and shivering in the trenches at
night, and to face any danger at their leader's call, while their
astounding cheerfulness and never-failing humor were gilding
with an ineffable radiance the darkness gathering around them
in these last days.

The months of December and January had passed. Less than
two months were to intervene before the last desperate struggle
of the two armies would be inaugurated. Intelligent scouts kept
us advised of the immense preparations progressing in the Union
lines for assaults upon our breastworks at an early date.

During the month of February, 1865 (I cannot now recall the
exact date), General Lee sent a messenger, about two o'clock in
the morning, to summon me to his headquarters. It was one of
the bitterest nights of that trying winter, and it required a ride of
several miles to reach the house on the outskirts of Petersburg
where the commanding-general made his headquarters. As I
entered, General Lee, who was entirely alone, was standing at
the fireplace, his arm on the mantel and his head resting on his
arm as he gazed into the coal fire burning in the grate. He had
evidently been up all the previous part of the night. For the first
time in all my intercourse with him, I saw a look of

painful depression on his face. Of course he had experienced
many hours of depression, but he had concealed from those
around him all evidence of discouragement. He had carried the
burden in his own soul--wrapping his doubts and apprehensions in
an exterior of cheerfulness and apparent confidence. The hour
had come, however, when he could no longer carry alone the
burden, or entirely conceal his forebodings of impending disaster.
General Longstreet and General Ewell were both twenty miles
away on their lines in front of Richmond; A. P. Hill, who for
weeks had been in delicate health, was absent on furlough; and I
found myself alone with the evidently depressed commander. To
me he had the appearance of one suffering from physical illness.
In answer to my inquiry as to his health, he stated that he was
well enough bodily, and had sent for me in order to counsel with
me as to our prospects, etc. In his room was a long table covered
with recent reports from every portion of his army. Some of
these reports had just reached him. He motioned me to a chair on
one side of the table, and seated himself opposite me. I had
known before I came that our army was in desperate straits; but
when I entered that room I realized at once, from the gravity of
the commander's bearing, that I was to learn of a situation worse
than I had anticipated. The interview was a long one, intensely
absorbing, and in many respects harrowing, and it produced in me
a keen sense of responsibility. It led, eventually, as will be seen,
to the last desperate assault upon Grant's lines at Petersburg
which was made by my troops.

I shall not attempt to quote General Lee literally, except
where his words were so engraved on my mind that I cannot
forget them while I remember anything. He opened the
conference by directing me to read the reports from the
different commands as he should hand

them to me, and to carefully note every important fact contained
in them.

The revelation was startling. Each report was bad enough,
and all the distressing facts combined were sufficient, it seemed
to me, to destroy all cohesive power and lead to the inevitable
disintegration of any other army that was ever marshalled. Of
the great disparity of numbers between the two hostile forces I
was already apprised. I had also learned much of the general
suffering among the troops; but the condition of my own
command, due to the special efforts of which I have spoken,
was not a fair measure of the suffering in the army. I was not
prepared for the picture presented by these reports of extreme
destitution--of the lack of shoes, of hats, of overcoats, and of
blankets, as well as of food. Some of the officers had gone
outside the formal official statement as to numbers of the sick, to
tell in plain, terse, and forceful words of depleted strength,
emaciation, and decreased power of endurance among those
who appeared on the rolls as fit for duty. Cases were given, and
not a few, where good men, faithful, tried, and devoted, gave
evidence of temporary insanity and indifference to orders or to
the consequences of disobedience--the natural and inevitable
effect of their mental and bodily sufferings. My recollection is
that General Lee stated that, since the reports from A. P. Hill's
corps had been sent in, he had learned that those men had just
been rationed on one sixth of a pound of beef, whereas the army
ration was a pound of beef per man per day, with the addition of
other supplies; that is to say, 600 of A. P. Hill's men were
compelled to subsist on less food than was issued to 100 men in
General Grant's army.

When I had finished the inspection of this array of serious
facts, and contemplated the bewildering woe which they
presented, General Lee began his own analysis

of the situation. He first considered the relative strength of
his army and that of General Grant. The exact number of his
own men was given in the reports before him--about 50,000, or
35,000 fit for duty. Against them he estimated that General
Grant had in front of Richmond and Petersburg, or within his
reach, about 150,000. Coming up from Knoxville was Thomas
with an estimated force of 30,000 superb troops, to whose
progress General Lee said we could offer practically no
resistance--only a very small force of poorly equipped cavalry
and detached bodies of infantry being available for that purpose.

"From the Valley," he said, "General Grant can and will bring
upon us nearly 20,000, against whom I can oppose scarcely a
vedette." This made an army of 200,000 well-fed, well-equipped
men which General Grant could soon concentrate upon our
force of 50,000, whose efficiency was greatly impaired by
suffering. Sherman was approaching from North Carolina, and
his force, when united with Schofield's, would reach 80,000.
What force had we to confront that army? General Beauregard
had telegraphed a few days before that, with the aid of
Governor Vance's Home Guards, he could muster probably
20,000 to 25,000. But General Joseph E. Johnston had just sent a
despatch saying in substance that General Beauregard had
overestimated his strength, and that it would be nearer the truth
to place the available Confederate force at from 13,000 to
15,000. So that the final summing up gave Grant the available
crushing power of 280,000 men, while to resist this
overwhelming force Lee had in round numbers only 65,000.

This estimate ended, the commander rose, and with one hand
resting upon the depressing reports, he stood contemplating them
for a moment, and then gravely walked to and fro across the
room, leaving me to my thoughts. My emotions were stirred to
their depths;

and as I now recall him standing at the table at four o'clock on
that February morning, silently contemplating those reports,--
the irrefutable demonstration of his inability to satisfy the
longings of the Southern people for independence,--it seems to
me that no commander could ever have felt a greater burden
than did Robert E. Lee at that hour.

My sense of responsibility reached its climax when he again
took his seat facing me at the table, and asked me to state
frankly what I thought under those conditions it was best to do--
or what duty to the army and our people required of us. Looking
at me intently, he awaited my answer. I had opinions, and by this
time they were fixed; but I hesitated to express them, not only
because of the tremendous importance of the question he had
propounded, but because I was uncertain of General Lee's
views, and it is never agreeable to a junior officer to maintain
opinions in conflict with those of the commander-in-chief,
especially a commander whom he regards, as I did Lee, as
almost infallible in such a crisis. But I replied:

"General, it seems to me there are but three courses, and I
name them in the order in which I think they should be tried:

"First, make terms with the enemy, the best we can get.

"Second, if that is not practicable, the best thing to do is to
retreat--abandon Richmond and Petersburg, unite by rapid
marches with General Johnston in North Carolina, and strike
Sherman before Grant can join him; or,

"Lastly, we must fight, and without delay."

Then again there was a period of silence, lasting, it is true, but
a few moments; but they were moments of extreme anxiety to
me. The question which he then asked only intensified my
anxiety. "Is that your opinion?"

but I thought there was a slight coloring of satire in his words
and manner; and this wounded and nettled me. I mildly resented
it by reminding him that I was there at his bidding, that I had
answered his question thoughtfully and frankly, that no man was
more concerned than I for the safety of the army and the
welfare of our people, and that I felt, under the circumstances,
that I also had the right to ask his opinion. I then discovered that
General Lee's manner was a method of testing the strength of
my convictions; for he replied in the kindest and most reassuring
manner:

"Certainly, general, you have the right to ask my opinion. I
agree with you fully."

I then asked him if he had made his views known to President
Davis or to the Congress. He replied that he had not; that he
scarcely felt authorized to suggest to the civil authorities the
advisability of making terms with the Government of the United States.

There was always complete communication between General
Lee and the Confederate Government in regard to military plans
and movements; but it was evident that he hesitated to advise or
make suggestions as to official action by the civil authorities.
Such expression of his views was, however, urgently requested,
as will be seen by the following extract from a letter to him from
the Secretary of War, dated March 8th:

My reflections on our recent conversations induce me to request
that you will give me fully your VIEWS on the military situation . . . . . It is
my purpose to submit your views . . . . . to the President to be
communicated by him to the Congress, if he shall think such a course
proper. . . . . I am sure your statements and opinions will be received with
the respect due to your exalted character and great services.

To this General Lee made a characteristic reply, from which
the following is an extract:

While the military situation is not favorable, it is not worse than the
superior numbers and resources of the enemy justified us in expecting.
Indeed, the legitimate military consequences of that superiority have
been postponed longer than we had reason to anticipate. Everything,
in my opinion, has depended and still depends upon the dispositions
and feelings of the people. Their representatives can best decide how
they will bear the difficulties and suffering of their condition, and how
they will respond to the demands which the public safety requires.

After brief comment upon the first course that had
been suggested, General Lee came to the second, namely, the
retreat and the uniting of his forces with those of Johnston in
North Carolina. He said that while he felt sure that this was the
next best thing to do, it would be attended with the gravest
difficulties; that, in the first
place, he doubted whether the authorities in Richmond would
consent to the movement, and, in the next place, it would
probably be still more difficult to get General Grant's consent;
but that if both President Davis and General Grant should notify
him that he could go, there would still be in his way the
deplorable plight of his
army. He dwelt at length upon it. Among other things, he
mentioned the fact that, in addition to the starving condition of
his men, his horses were dying from starvation, and that he could
not move one half of his artillery and ammunition and supply
trains. He added that the cavalry horses were in horrid condition,
and that he could not supply their places, as the country was
exhausted; that when a cavalry horse died or was shot, it was
equivalent to the loss of both horse and rider, so far as that arm
of the service was concerned; whereas General Grant could
mount ten thousand additional horsemen in a few days if he
wished to do so, and could
retard our retreat, vex our flanks, and cut off our supplies.

General Lee, like his private soldiers, had a vein of humor in
him which was rarely exhibited except when it served some
good purpose. It often appeared when least expected, but was
always most opportune. While speaking of the vast superiority of
Grant's numbers and resources and his own rapidly accumulating
embarrassments he relaxed the tension for a moment by saying:

"By the way, I received a verbal message from General
Grant to-day."

"What was it?" I asked.

He explained that General Grant had sent, under flag of truce,
a request to cease firing long enough for him to bury his dead
between the picket-lines. The officer who bore the flag of truce
asked to be conducted to army headquarters, as he had a
message to deliver to General Lee in person. Arriving at
headquarters, he received General Lee's courteous salutations,
and, having explained the nature of his mission, said: "General,
as I left General Grant's tent this morning he gave me these
instructions:'Give General Lee my personal compliments, and
say to him that I keep in such close touch with him that I know
what he eats for breakfast every morning.' " I asked General
Lee what reply he made. He said: "I told the officer to tell
General Grant that I thought there must be some mistake about
the latter part of his message; for unless he [General Grant] had
fallen from grace since I saw him last, he would not permit me to
eat such breakfasts as mine without dividing his with me." He
then added: "I also requested the officer to present my
compliments to General Grant, and say to him that I know
perhaps as much about his dinners as he knew about my
breakfasts."

This, of course, meant that each of the commanders, through
scouts and spies, and through such statements as they could
extract from prisoners or deserters kept

This little diversion ended, the commander returned to the
discussion of the three courses which the serious situation
presented. Without an explicit expression to that effect, the
entire trend of his words led me to the conclusion that he thought
immediate steps should be taken to secure peace, and before the
interview ended he expressed to me his determination to go to
Richmond.

It was near sunrise when I left him and rode back to my
quarters. On his return from Richmond, he informed me of the
result of his conferences with the civil authorities. Of President
Davis he spoke in terms of strong eulogy: of the strength of his
convictions, of his devotedness, of his remarkable faith in the
possibility of still winning our independence, and of his
unconquerable will power; and he added: "You know that the
President is very pertinacious in opinion and purpose." President
Davis did not believe we could secure such terms as we could
afford to accept, and was indisposed to make further effort after
the failure of the Hampton Roads conference. Neither were the
authorities ready to evacuate the capital and abandon our lines of
defence, although every railroad except the South Side was
already broken.

Paganini, the unrivalled violinist of Genoa, in one of his great
exhibitions is said to have had the strings of his violin break, one
after another, until he had but one left. Undismayed by these
serious mishaps, and pointing to his dismantled instrument, he
proudly exclaimed to the audience that he still had left, "One
string and Paganini!" Jefferson Davis, holding to the
Confederate capital, notwithstanding every line of railroad
except one had been broken by the enemy, was yet confident,
and felt in his heart that he still had enough left in the "one string
and Lee's army."

CHAPTER XXVII

CAPTURE OF FORT STEDMAN

In the trenches at Petersburg--General Lee's instructions--A daring plan
formed--Preparations for a night assault--An ingenious war ruse--The
fort captured with small loss--Failure of reënforcements to arrive--Loss
of guides--Necessary withdrawal from the fort--The last effort to break
Grant's hold.

LIKE fires that consume the dross and make pure the metal,
Confederate distress and extremity seemed to strengthen and
ennoble rather than weaken Confederate
manhood. My hungry and debilitated men welcomed with a
readiness intensely pathetic the order to break camp and move
into the trenches at Petersburg. Their buoyancy of
spirit was in no degree due to a lack of appreciation of the
meaning of that night march. They were not mere machine
soldiers, moved by a superior intelligence to
which they blindly yielded obedience. They were thoughtful men,
with naturally keen perceptions sharpened by long experience in
actual war. They well knew that the order meant more
suffering, more fighting, more slaughter; yet, if their conduct
and assurances are trustworthy
witnesses, these men were prepared for any additional
sacrifices. There was no shouting or yelling; but silently, quickly,
and cheerfully they folded their little sheet tents, packed their
frying-pans and tin cups, and were promptly in line, with their
knapsacks on their backs, their lean and empty haversacks on one side
and

full cartridge-boxes on the other, ready for the rapid night march
to Petersburg, where every bloody ditch and frowning fort was
to them a herald of another deadly conflict.

As I now look back to that scene of busy preparation by the
dim light of the camp-fires, and recall the fact that not only the
officers but the intelligent privates in the ranks knew that this
hasty preparation was the prelude to perhaps the last desperate
effort of Lee's little army to break Grant's grip on the
Confederate capital, the question presses itself upon me: How
can we account for such self-command and steadfast fidelity
in the presence of apparently inevitable and overwhelming
disaster? An English nobleman, while placing his head upon the
block, is said to have indulged in jest at the executioner's axe; but
there was no such vainglory in the wonderful serenity of these
thoughtful men. To one who has experienced it, there is no
difficulty in understanding what the Romans called the glory of
battle; but that stimulant was entirely wanting in this case. It is
easy enough to explain the mental intoxication of the young Earl
of Essex, who, as he sailed in to a naval fight, threw his hat into
the sea in a transport of martial ecstasy. This boundless joy of
Essex was the presentiment of a coming triumph, and is no more
mysterious than the instinct of the eagle bending to catch the roar
of the rising tempest, conscious that its wildest blasts will bear
him to higher and prouder flights. It is easy enough to
comprehend the enthusiasm of these same Confederates during
the long period when recurring battles meant recurring victories.
Now, however, in the last days of the Confederacy, and
especially during the dreary winter of 1864-65, these conditions
were all changed. Practically every available man in the South
was already at the front, and the inability to secure an exchange
of prisoners made it impossible to fill the thinning

ranks of our armies. The supplies were exhausted, and it
was impracticable to give the men sufficient food. Everything
was exhausted except devotion and valor. The very air we
breathed was changed. There was no longer in it the
exhilaration of victory with which it had been so constantly
surcharged in past years. Yet in the light of their camp-fires I
could see in the faces of these men an expression of manly
resolve almost equal to that which they had worn in the days of
their brightest hopes. It is impossible to explain this unswerving
purpose to fight to the last, except upon this one hypothesis.
They felt that their struggle was a defence of State, of home,
and of liberty; and for these they were ready to die. The world's
most consecrated martyrs can lay no higher claim to immortality.

General Lee's instructions to me were substantially as follows:
"Move your troops into the works around the city as I withdraw
one of the other commands from them. Make your headquarters
in the city. Study General Grant's works at all points, consider
carefully all plans and possibilities, and then tell me what you can
do, if anything, to help us in our dilemma."

The very narrow space between Lee's and Grant's lines, the
vigilance of the pickets who stood within speaking range of each
other, and the heavily loaded guns which commanded every foot
of intrenchments, made the removal of one body of troops and
the installing of another impracticable by daylight and quite
hazardous even at night. We moved, however, cautiously
through the city to the breastworks, and, as the other corps was
secretly withdrawn, my command glided into the vacated
trenches as softly and noiselessly as the smooth flow of a river.

More than a month prior to this change, General Lee wrote to
the authorities at Richmond, after these men had stood in line
for three days and nights in extremely

cold weather: "Some of the men have been without meat for
three days, and all of them are suffering from reduced rations
and scant clothing while exposed to battle, cold, hail, and sleet."
He also stated that the chief commissary reported that he had
not a pound of meat at his disposal. General Lee added: "The
physical strength of the men, if their courage survives, must fail
under this treatment." These were the men with whom I was
soon to make a most daring assault, and these the conditions
under which it must be made.

The breastworks behind which stood the brave army in blue
appeared to be as impenetrable by any force which Lee could
send against them as is a modern ironclad to the missiles from an
ordinary field battery: but if there was a weak point in those
defences, I was expected to find it. If such a point could be
found, I was expected to submit to General Lee some plan by
which it would be feasible, or at least possible, for his depleted
army to assail it successfully.

Giving but few hours in the twenty-four to rest and sleep, I
labored day and night at this exceedingly grave and discouraging
problem, on the proper solution of which depended the
commander's decision as to when and where he would deliver
his last blow for the life of the Confederacy. My efficient staff--
Majors Moore, Hunter, Dabney, and Pace, and Captains
Markoe, Wilmer, and Jones--were constantly engaged gathering
information from every possible source. The prisoners captured
were closely questioned, and their answers noted and weighed.
Deserters from the Federal army added valuable material to the
information I was acquiring.

The fact that there were desertions from the Union to the
Confederate army at this late period of the war is difficult to
understand. Indeed, such desertions were among those
mysterious occurrences which are inexplicable on any ordinary
hypothesis. It was to be expected

that some of the newly enlisted Confederates, some of those
reluctant recruits who were induced to join our ranks under the
persuasive influence of the Confederate Conscript Law, should
abandon us in our extremity; but when all the conditions pointed
to certain and speedy Union success, where can we find
impelling motives strong enough to induce General Grant's men
to desert his overwhelming forces and seek shelter with the
maimed and starving Confederate army? The bravest and most
loyal sailors will abandon a sinking battle-ship and accept safety
on the deck of the triumphant vessel of the enemy. In the case
of General Grant's men, however, this natural impulse seemed
to be reversed. They were not leaving a disabled ship. They
were deserting a mighty and increasing fleet for a place on the
deck of an isolated and badly crippled man-of-war--one that
was fighting grandly, it is true, but fighting single-handed, almost
hopelessly, with its ammunition and supplies nearly exhausted, its
engines disabled, and its hull heavily leaking.

It required a week of laborious examination and intense
thought to enable me to reach any definite conclusion. Every
rod of the Federal intrenchments, every fort and parapet on the
opposing line of breastworks and on the commanding hills in rear
of them, every sunken path of the pickets and every supporting
division of infantry behind the works, had to be noted and
carefully scrutinized. The character of the obstructions in front
of each portion of the Union works had to be critically examined
and an estimate made as to the time it would require to cut them
away so that my men could mount the breastworks or rush into
the fort selected for our attack. The distance between the
opposing works and the number of seconds or minutes it would
require for my troops to rush across were important factors in
estimating the chances of success or failure, and required

the closest calculation. The decision as to the most vulnerable
point for attack involved two additional questions of vital
importance. The first was: From what point on my own
intrenchments could my assaulting column rush forth on its
desperate night sally, with the least probability of arousing the
sleeping foe? The second was: How many intervening ditches
were there, and of what width and depth, over which my men
were to leap or into which they might fall in the perilous passage?
All these points considered, I decided that Fort Stedman on
Grant's lines was the most inviting point for attack and Colquitt's
Salient on Lee's lines the proper place from which to sally. This
point in our lines took its name from my lifelong friend, General
Alfred Holt Colquitt of Georgia, whose memory will live in
Southern hearts, as fresh and green as the fadeless verdure of
the pines which now grow upon the salient's embankment,
striking their roots deep into the earth which was reddened by
the blood of his stalwart Georgians. These men stood and fought
and suffered there, commanded by this superb officer, who won
by his brilliant victory in Florida the proud title, "Hero of
Olustee." General Colquitt lived long after the war closed, giving
conservative counsel to his people, recognized as the friend of
both races, and serving with distinction as governor of his State
and as United States senator. He died at his post of duty in
Washington in 1893.

The plan of the attack on Fort Stedman was fully developed
in my own mind; and whether it was good or bad, the
responsibility for it was upon me, not because there was any
indisposition on General Lee's part to make a plan of his own
and order its execution, but because he had called me from the
extreme right to his centre at Petersburg for this purpose. With
him was the final decision--approval or rejection.

As soon as he was notified that I was ready to report, he
summoned me to his quarters. After such a lapse of time I
cannot give General Lee's exact words in so prolonged a
conference, but the following questions and answers faithfully
represent the substance of the interview.

"What can you do?" he asked.

"I can take Fort Stedman, sir."

"How, and from what point?"

"By a night assault from Colquitt's Salient, and a sudden,
quick rush across ditches, where the enemy's pickets are on
watch, running over the pickets and capturing them, or, if they
resist, using the bayonet."

"But the chevaux-de-frise protecting your front is, I believe,
fastened together at Colquitt's Salient with chains and spikes.
This obstruction will have to be removed before your column of
attack can pass out of our works. Do you think you can remove
these obstructions without attracting the attention of Union
pickets which are only a few rods away? You are aware that
they are especially vigilant at night, and that any unusual noise
on your lines would cause them to give the alarm, arousing their
men in the fort, who would quickly turn loose upon you their
heavy guns loaded with grape and canister."

"This is a serious difficulty; but I feel confident that it can be
overcome. I propose to intrust the delicate task of getting our
obstructions removed to a few select men, who will begin the
work after dark, and, with the least possible noise, make a
passageway for my troops by 4 A.M., at which hour the sally is to
be made."

"But suppose you succeed in removing the obstructions in
front of your own lines without attracting the attention of
General Grant's pickets and get your column under full headway
and succeed in capturing or killing the pickets before they can
give the alarm; you will have

a still more serious difficulty to overcome when you reach the
strong and closely built obstructions in front of Fort Stedman and
along the enemy's works. Have you ascertained how these
obstructions are made and thought of any way to get over them
or through them? You know that a delay of even a few minutes
would, insure a consuming fire upon your men, who, while
halting, would be immediately in front of the heavy guns in the
fort."

"I recognize fully, general, the force of all you say; but let me
explain. Through prisoners and deserters I have learned during
the past week all about the obstructions in front of General
Grant's lines. They are exceedingly formidable. They are made
of rails, with the lower ends deeply buried in the ground. The
upper ends are sharpened and rest upon poles, to which they are
fastened by strong wires. These sharp points are about
breast-high, and my men could not possibly get over them. They
are about six or eight inches apart; and we could not get through
them. They are so securely fastened together and to the
horizontal poles by the telegraph wires that we could not possibly
shove them apart so as to pass them. There is but one thing to
do. They must be chopped to pieces by heavy, quick blows with
sharp axes. I propose to select fifty brave and especially robust
and active men, who will be armed only with axes. These
axemen will rush across, closely followed by my troops, and will
slash down a passage for my men almost at a single blow. This
stalwart force will rush into the fort with the head of my column,
and, if necessary, use their axes instead of bayonets in any hand-to-hand
conflict inside the fort. I think I can promise you, general,
that we will go into that fort; but what we are going to do when
we get in is the most serious problem of all."

considered every phase of the hazardous programme. He
expressed neither approval nor disapproval; but he directed me
to explain fully the further details of the plan on the supposition
that by possibility we could take Fort Stedman and the lines on
each side of it.

The purpose of the movement was not simply the capture of
Fort Stedman and the breastworks flanking it. The prisoners and
guns we might thus capture would not justify the peril of the
undertaking. The tremendous possibility was the disintegration of
the whole left wing of the Federal army, or at least the dealing
of such a staggering blow upon it as would disable it temporarily,
enabling us to withdraw from Petersburg in safety and join
Johnston in North Carolina. The capture of the fort was only the
breasting of the first wave in the ocean of difficulties to be
encountered. It was simply the opening of a road through the
wilderness of hostile works nearest to us in order that my corps
and the additional forces to be sent me could pass toward the
rear of Grant's lines and then turn upon his flanks.

General Lee resumed his questions, saying in substance:

"Well, suppose you capture the fort, what are you going to do
with the strong line of infantry in the ravine behind the fort and
the three other forts in the rear which command Fort Stedman?
Do you think you can carry those three forts by assault after
General Grant's army has been aroused by your movement?"

"Those forts, general, cannot be taken by direct assault when
fully manned, except at great sacrifice to our troops. In front of
them is a network of abatis which makes a direct advance upon
them extremely difficult. There is, however, an open space in
the rear of them, and if I can reach that space in the darkness
with a sufficient number of men to overpower the guards, I can
take those three forts also, without heavy loss. I suggest that we
attempt their capture by a legitimate

stratagem; if that fails, then at dawn to rush with all the troops
available toward Grant's left, meeting emergencies as best we
can. To accomplish much by such a movement, you would have
to send me nearly or quite one half of your army. I greatly prefer
to try the stratagem, the success of which depends on a number
of contingencies."

He asked me to state fully each step in the programme, and I
continued:

"During the week of investigation I have learned the name of
every officer of rank in my front. I propose to select three
officers from my corps, who are to command each a body of
100 men. These officers are to assume the names of three
Union officers who are in and near Fort Stedman. When I have
carried Fort Stedman, each of these selected officers is to rush
in the darkness to the rear with his 100 men, shouting:'The
Rebels have carried Fort Stedman and our front lines!' They are
to maintain no regular order, but each body of 100 is to keep
close to its leader. As these three officers strike the line of
infantry in rear of the fort and at different points, they will be
halted; but each of them will at once represent himself as the
Union officer whose name he bears, and is to repeat: 'The
Rebels have captured our works, and I am ordered by General
McLaughlin to rush back to the fort in rear and hold it at all
hazards.'

"Each body of 100 men will thus pass the supporting line of
Union infantry and go to the rear of the fort to which I will direct
the leader. They are to enter, overpower the Union guards, and
take possession of the fort. Thus the three forts will be
captured."

General Lee asked if I thought my officers would each be
able in the darkness to find the fort which he was seeking. I
replied:

guides. The trees have been cut down, the houses have been
burned, and the whole topography of that portion of the field so
changed that it will require men who are thoroughly familiar with
the locality to act as guides. I have no such men in my corps;
and without proper guides my three detachments will be
sacrificed after taking Fort Stedman and passing the rear line of
infantry."

Again there was a long discussion of the chances and the
serious difficulties in this desperate adventure. These were fully
recognized by General Lee, as they had been by myself when
the successive steps in the undertaking were formulated in my
own mind. He said in substance: "If you think, after careful
consideration, that you can probably carry Fort Stedman, and
then get your three companies of 100 through the line of
supporting infantry, I will endeavor to find among the Virginia
volunteers three men whose homes were on that part of the field
where the rear forts stand, to act as, guides to your three
officers. I do not know of such men now, but will at once make
search for them."

He directed me to proceed with the selection of my men for
the different parts of the programme, but not to notify them until
he had made search for the guides and had thought the whole
plan over. Twenty-four hours later occurred the final
conference before the attack. With the exception of the last
council of war on the night before the surrender, I believe this
conference on the night of March 23, 1865, was the most
serious and impressive in my experience. General Lee had
thought of all the chances: he had found three men, whom he did
not know in person, but who were recommended for the three
guides; he had selected different troops to send me from other
corps, making, with mine, nearly one half of his army, and had
decided that we should make one supreme effort to break the
cordon tightening around us. These troops were to come from
Longstreet's and

A. P. Hill's corps. A body of cavalry was to be sent me, which,
in case we succeeded in getting into the three rear forts, was to
ride across the broken gap at Fort Stedman, and then gallop to
the rear, destroy Grant's railroad and telegraph lines, and cut
away his pontoons across the river, while the infantry swept
down the rear of the Union intrenchments.

With full recognition by both the commander and myself of
the hopelessness of our cause if we waited longer on General
Grant's advance, and also of the great hazard in moving against
him, the tremendous undertaking was ordered.

All night my troops were moving and concentrating behind
Colquitt's Salient. For hours Mrs. Gordon sat in her room in
Petersburg, tearing strips of white cloth to tie across the breasts
of the leading detachments, that they might recognize each other
in the darkness and in the hand-to-hand battle expected at the
Federal breastworks and inside the fort.

The fifty heavy keen-edged axes were placed in the hands of
the fifty brave and stalwart fellows who were to lead the
column and hew down Grant's obstructions. The strips of white
cloth were tied upon them, and they were ready for the
desperate plunge.

The chosen 300, in three companies, under the three officers
bearing names of Union officers, were also bedecked with the
white cotton Confederate scarfs. To each of these companies
was assigned one of the three selected guides. I explained to the
300 men the nature of their duties, and told them that, in addition
to the joy it would give them to aid in giving victory to the army,
I would see to it, if the three forts were captured, that each of
them should have a thirty days' furlough and a silver medal.
Although the rear forts were not captured, the failure was not
the fault of the 300; and even to this day, nearly forty years
afterward, I occasionally receive

applications for the medal, accompanied by the statement
that I need not trouble myself to get the furlough,
as they received that some days later at Appomatox.

The hour for the assault (4 A.M.) arrived. The column
of attack was arranged in the following order: the 50
axemen in front, and immediately behind and close to
them the selected 300. Next came
the different commands of infantry who were to move
in close behind the 300, the cavalry being held in reserve
until the way for them was cleared.

While my preparations were progressing I received
from General Lee the
following note, which is here given because it was written with
his own hand, and because it expresses the earnest prayer for
our success which came from his burdened heart, and which he
could not suppress even in this short semi-official
communication:

4.30 P.M. Hd Qr (24) March '65.

Genl: I have received yours of 2:30 P.M. and telegraphed for
Pickett's Division, but I do not think it will reach here in time. Still
we will try. If you need more troops one or both of Heth's
brigades can be called to Colquitt's Salient and Wilcox's to the
Baxter road. Dispose of the troops as needed. I pray that a
merciful God may grant us success and deliver us from our
enemies.

Yours truly,

R. E. LEE, Genl.

Genl. J. B. GORDON, etc.P. S. The Cavalry is ordered to report to you at Halifax road
and Norfolk R.R. Iron Bridge at 3 A.M. tomorrow. W. F. Lee to
be in vicinity of Monk's corner Road at 6 A.M.

All things ready, at 4 A.M. I stood on the top of the
breastworks, with no one at my side except a single private
soldier with rifle in hand, who was to fire the
signal shot for the headlong rush. This night charge on the fort
was to be across the intervening space

covered with ditches, in one of which stood the watchful Federal
pickets. There still remained near my works some of the debris
of our obstructions, which had not been completely removed and
which I feared might, retard the rapid exit of my men; and I
ordered it cleared away. The noise made by this removal, though
slight, attracted the attention of a Union picket who stood on
guard only a few rods from me, and he called out:

"What are you doing over there, Johnny? What is that noise?
Answer quick or I 'll shoot."

The pickets of the two armies were so close together at this
point that there was an understanding between them, either
expressed or implied, that they would not shoot each other down
except when necessary. The call of this Union picket filled me
with apprehension. I expected him to fire and start the entire
picket-line to firing, thus giving the alarm to the fort, the capture
of which depended largely upon the secrecy of my movement.
The quick mother-wit of the private soldier at my side came to
my relief. In an instant he replied:

"Never mind, Yank. Lie down and go to sleep. We are just
gathering a little corn. You know rations are mighty short over
here."

There was a narrow strip of corn which the bullets had not
shot away still standing between the lines. The Union picket
promptly answered: "All right, Johnny; go ahead and get your
corn. I 'll not shoot at you while you are drawing your rations."

Such soldierly courtesy was constantly illustrated between
these generous foes, who stood so close to one another in the
hostile lines. The Rev. J. William Jones, D.D., now chaplain-general
of the United Confederate Veterans, when standing
near this same point had his hat carried away by a gust of wind,
and it fell near the

Union lines. The loss of a hat meant the loss to the chaplain of
nearly a month's pay. He turned away sorrowfully, not knowing
how he could get another. A heroic young private, George
Haner of Virginia, said to him: "Chaplain, I will get your hat."
Taking a pole in his hand, he crawled along the ditch which led
to our picket-line, and began to drag the hat in with his pole. At
this moment a Yankee bullet went through the sleeve of his
jacket. He at once shouted to the Union picket: "Hello, Yank;
quit your foolishness. I am doing no harm. I am just trying to get
the chaplain's hat." Immediately the reply came: "All right,
Johnny; I 'll not shoot at you any more. But you 'd better hurry
up and get it before the next relief comes."

My troops stood in close column, ready for the hazardous rush
upon Fort Stedman. While the fraternal dialogue in reference to
drawing rations from the cornfield was progressing between the
Union picket and the resourceful private at my side, the last of
the obstructions in my front were removed, and I ordered the
private to fire the signal for the assault. He pointed his rifle
upward, with his finger on the trigger, but hesitated. His
conscience seemed to get hold of him. He was going into the
fearful charge, and he evidently did not feel disposed to go
into eternity with the lie on his lips, although it might be a
permissible war lie, by which he had thrown the Union picket off
his guard. He evidently felt that it was hardly fair to take
advantage of the generosity and soldierly sympathy of his foe,
who had so magnanimously assured him that he would not be
shot while drawing his rations from the little field of corn. His
hesitation surprised me, and I again ordered: "Fire your gun, sir."
He at once called to his kindhearted foe and said: "Hello, Yank!
Wake up; we are going to shell the woods. Look out; we are
coming."

up accounts with the Yankee picket, he fired the shot and
rushed forward in the darkness.

As the solitary signal shot rang out in the stillness, my alert
pickets, who had crept close to the Union sentinels, sprang like
sinewy Ajaxes upon them and prevented the discharge of a single
alarm shot. Had these faithful Union sentinels been permitted to
fire alarm guns, my dense columns, while rushing upon the fort,
would have been torn into fragments by the heavy guns.
Simultaneously with the seizing and silencing of the Federal
sentinels, my stalwart axemen leaped over our breastworks,
closely followed by the selected 300 and the packed column of
infantry. Although it required but a few minutes to reach the
Union works, those minutes were to me like hours of suspense
and breathless anxiety; but soon was heard the thud of the heavy
axes as my brave fellows slashed down the Federal obstructions.
The next moment the infantry sprang upon the Union breastworks
and into the fort, overpowering the gunners before their
destructive charges could be emptied into the mass of
Confederates. They turned this captured artillery upon the
flanking lines on each side of the fort, clearing the Union
breastworks of their defenders for some distance in both
directions. Up to this point, the success had exceeded my most
sanguine expectations. We had taken Fort Stedman and a long
line of breastworks on either side. We had captured nine heavy
cannon, eleven mortars, nearly 1000 prisoners, including General
McLaughlin, with the loss of less than half a dozen men. One of
these fell upon the works, pierced through the body by a Federal
bayonet, one of the few men thus killed in the four years of war. I
was in the fort myself, and relieved General McLaughlin by
assuming command of Fort Stedman.

From the fort I sent word to General Lee, who was on a hill
in the rear, that we were in the works and that

the 300 were on their way to the lines in the rear. Soon I
received a message from one of these three officers, I believe
General Lewis of North Carolina, that he had passed the line of
Federal infantry without trouble by representing himself as
Colonel - - - - - of the Hundredth Pennsylvania, but that he could not
find his fort, as the guide had been lost in the rush upon
Stedman. I soon received a similar message from the other two,
and so notified General Lee.

Daylight was coming. Through the failure of the three guides,
we had failed to occupy the three forts in the rear, and they
were now filled with Federals. Our wretched railroad trains had
broken down, and the troops who were coming to my aid did not
reach me. The full light of the morning revealed the gathering
forces of Grant and the great preponderance of his numbers. It
was impossible for me to make further headway with my
isolated corps, and General Lee directed me to withdraw. This
was not easily accomplished. Foiled by the failure of the guides,
deprived of the great bodies of infantry which Lee ordered to
my support, I had necessarily stretched out my corps to occupy
the intrenchments which we had captured. The other troops
were expected to arrive and join in the general advance. The
breaking down of the trains and the non-arrival of these heavy
supports left me to battle alone with Grant's gathering and
overwhelming forces, and at the same time to draw in my own
lines toward Fort Stedman. A consuming fire on both flanks and
front during this withdrawal caused a heavy loss to my
command. I myself was wounded, but not seriously, in
recrossing the space over which we had charged in the
darkness. Among the disabled was the gallant Brigadier-General
Philip Cook of Georgia, who after the war represented his
people in the United States Congress.

report reached me that an entire Confederate regiment had not
received the order to withdraw, and was still standing in the
Union breastworks, bravely fighting. It was necessary to send
them orders or leave them to their fate. I called my staff around
me, and explained the situation and the extreme danger the
officer would encounter in carrying that order. I stated to them
that the pain I experienced in sending one of them on so perilous
a mission was greater than I could express. Every one of them
quickly volunteered to go; but Thomas G. Jones of Alabama
insisted that as he was the youngest and had no special
responsibilities, it should fall to his lot to incur the danger. I bade
him good-by with earnest prayers that God would protect him,
and without an apparent tremor he rode away. A portion of the
trip was through a literal furnace of fire, but he passed through it,
both going and returning, without a scratch.

This last supreme effort to break the hold of General Grant
upon Petersburg and Richmond was the expiring struggle of the
Confederate giant, whose strength was nearly exhausted and
whose limbs were heavily shackled by the most onerous
conditions. Lee knew, as we all did, that the chances against us
were as a hundred is to one; but we remembered how George
Washington, with his band of ragged rebels, had won American
independence through trials and sufferings and difficulties, and
although they were far less discouraging and insurmountable
than those around us, they were nevertheless many and great. It
seemed better, therefore, to take the one chance, though it might
be one in a thousand, rather than to stand still while the little
army was being depleted, its vitality lessening with each setting
sun, and its life gradually ebbing, while the great army in its front
was growing and strengthening day by day. To wait was certain
destruction: it could not be worse if we tried and failed. The
accidents and mishaps which checked the

brilliant assault made by my brave men, and which rendered
their further advance impossible, could not have been
anticipated. But for those adverse happenings, it would seem
that we might have won on that single chance.

This spasm of Confederate aggressive vigor inaugurated the
period of more than two weeks of almost incessant battle,
beginning on the morning of March 25th with the charge of my
troops at Petersburg, and ending with the last charge of Lee's
army, made by these same men on the morning of April
9th at Appomattox.

CHAPTER XXVIII

EVACUATION OF PETERSBURG

Religious spirit of the soldiers in extremity--Some amusing anecdotes--
Fall of Five Forks--Death of General A. P. Hill--The line of defence
stretched to breaking--General Lee's order to withdraw from Petersburg-- Continuous fighting during the retreat--Stirring adventure of a Confederate
scout--His retaliation--Lee directs the movement toward Appomattox.

PETERSBURG--the Cockade City--was scarcely less noted
than Richmond itself for its high military spirit, its devotion to the
Confederacy, and the extent of its sacrifices for the Southern
cause. There was scarcely a home within its corporate limits that
was not open to the sick and wounded of Lee's army. Its
patriotic citizens denied themselves all luxuries and almost actual
necessaries in order to feed and strengthen the hungry fighters in
the trenches. Its women, who were noted for culture and
refinement, became nurses, as consecrated as Florence
Nightingale, as they soothed the sufferings and strengthened the
hopes of the dying soldiers. Now and then, in the experiences of
the young people, the subtle radiance of romance lighted up the
gloom of the hospitals.

A beautiful Southern girl, on her daily mission of love and
mercy, asked a badly wounded soldier boy what she could do for
him. He replied: "I 'm greatly obliged to you, but it is too late for
you to do anything for me. I am so badly shot that I can't live
long."

"Will you not let me pray for you? I hope that I am one of the
Lord's daughters, and I would like to ask Him to help you."

Looking intently into her bewitching face, he replied:
"Yes, pray at once, and ask the Lord to let me be His
son-in-law."

The susceptible young soldier had evidently received, at this
interview, another wound, which served to convert his
apprehensions of death into a longing for domestic life.

During the two weeks following the sudden seizure of Fort
Stedman and its equally sudden release, my legs were rarely out
of my long boots. For eight days the shifting scenes and
threatening demonstrations on my front, and in front of A. P.
Hill on my right, kept me on horseback until my tired limbs and
aching joints made a constant appeal for rest. The coming of
night brought little or no cessation of the perplexing and fatiguing
activities. Night after night troops were marching, heavy guns
were roaring, picket-lines were driven in and had to be
reëstablished; and the great mortars from both Union and
Confederate works were hurling high in the air their ponderous
shells, which crossed each other's paths and, with burning fuses,
like tails of flying comets, descended in meteoric showers on the
opposing intrenchments. The breastworks protecting the
battle-lines were so high and broad that the ordinary cannonballs
and shells could not penetrate them and reach the soldiers who
stood behind them. In order, therefore, to throw shells into the
ranks of the opposing army, these mortars were introduced. They
were short, big-mouthed cannon, and were pointed upward, but
leaning slightly toward the enemy's lines, and their great shells
were hurled skyward, and then came whirling down, exploding
with terrific force among the men who stood or slept behind the
breastworks.

At a point near where the left of A. P. Hill's corps touched
the right of mine, a threatened attack brought together for
counsel a number of officers from each of these commands.
After this conference as to the proper disposition of troops for
resisting the expected assault, we withdrew into a small log hut
standing near, and united in prayer to Almighty God for His
guidance. As we assembled, one of our generals was riding
within hailing distance, and General Harry Heth of Hill's corps
stepped to the door of the log cabin and called to him to come in
and unite with us in prayer. The officer did not understand the
nature of General Heth's invitation, and
replied: "No, thank you, general; no more at present; I 've just
had some."

This amusing incident, while it convulsed the small assemblage
with laughter, did not delay many moments the earnest petitions
for deliverance. From the commander-in-chief to the privates in
the ranks, there was a deep and sincere religious feeling in Lee's
army. Whenever it was convenient or practicable, these hungry
but unyielding men were holding prayer-meetings. Their
supplications were fervent and often inspiring, but now and then
there were irresistibly amusing touches. At one of these
gatherings for prayer was a private who had lost one leg. Unable
to kneel, he sat with bowed head, while one of his comrades,
whom we shall call Brother Jones, led in prayer. Brother Jones
was earnestly praying for more manhood, more strength, and
more courage. The brave old one-legged Confederate did not
like Brother Jones's prayer. At that period of the war, he felt
that it was almost absurd to be asking God to give the
Confederates more courage, of which virtue they already had an
abundant supply. So he called out from his seat: "Hold on there,
Brother Jones. Don't you know you are praying all wrong?
Why don't you pray for more provisions? We 've got more courage
now than we have any use for!"

This did not occur in my immediate camp, but a similar
incident did. In a meeting for prayer near my headquarters, there
was more than the usual impressiveness--more of that peculiar
sadness which is significant of a brave despair. As in all the
religious gatherings in the army, all denominations of Christians
were represented. The chaplain who conducted the solemn
services asked a number of officers and others to lead in prayer.
Among them, he called upon a private who belonged to my
sharpshooters, and who had not had the advantages of an early
education. This consecrated soldier knelt close by my side, and
with his heart all aglow with the spirit of the meeting, and his
mind filled with strong convictions as to the justice of our cause,
he said in a clear, ringing voice: "Oh, Lord, we are having a
mighty big fight down here, and a sight of trouble; and we do
hope, Lord, that you will take a proper view of this subject, and
give us the victory."

As for himself, he had no doubt as to what a "proper view"
of the great conflict was. None of them had. While they fully
comprehended the situation from an earthly or purely military
point of view, they hoped to the last that by some miraculous
intervention the "proper view of the subject" would ultimately
prevail.

The general-in-chief and his corps commanders were
kept fairly well advised by our scouts as to General
Grant's preparations and movements; but, independent
of this direct intelligence, there were other indications
which could not be misunderstood. The roads were wet,
and hence no clouds of dust rose above the the tree-tops
to tell us during the day of Grant's progress; but at night
his camp-fires in the pines painted a light on the horizon
near us which admonished us that he was marching
around our right to seize the South Side Railroad and
force us out of our trenches. Sheridan's large bodies of
cavalry, supported by infantry, soon appeared in the
neighborhood of Five Forks--a point from which roads

led in five directions. It was a strategic point of such importance
to Lee, for either the continued defence of Petersburg or the
withdrawal of his army, that he determined to hold it until
surrender was inevitable. He, therefore, adopted the same bold,
aggressive policy which had so repeatedly thwarted the flank
movements of his great antagonist on every battle-field from the
Wilderness to Petersburg. Withdrawing all the troops that could
be spared from the trenches, Lee hurled his depleted but still
resolute little army against Grant's heavy lines of infantry on the
march to Five Forks, and drove back in confusion that portion of
the Federal army; but the small Confederate force there
employed was utterly inadequate either to press the temporary
advantage or to hold the position it had won. It was quickly swept
from the front of the overpowering Federals, and the
concentration upon Five Forks was accomplished. The small
force of Confederates which defended it fought with
characteristic courage. In the first encounter General Sheridan's
forces were repelled from the breastworks. But soon the devoted
little band of gray was torn by artillery, harried by cavalry, and
assaulted by infantry on every side; and the Confederate flags
went down, while their brave defenders were surrounded by a
cordon of fire. Five Forks fell, with the loss of large numbers of
Confederates in killed, wounded, and prisoners. Turning from
Five Forks in the direction of Petersburg, the victorious Federals
came upon the flank and rear of the defensive works around the
city. Longstreet's corps had been ordered from the lines around
Richmond, but came too late to prevent the disaster at Five
Forks. It was not too late, however, to check the flanking force
of Federals marching upon the city from that direction. A part of
A. P. Hill's corps was formed at right angles to the trenches and
shared in the furious fighting. That brilliant corps-commander and

devoted patriot, whose name was the synonym of chivalry, gave
his life to the cause he loved in these last dark hours of the
expiring Confederacy.

As General Lee rode back toward Petersburg from Five
Forks, near which he had led in person a brilliant and successful
charge, he said to one of his aides: "This is a sad business,
colonel." In a few minutes he added: "It has happened as I told
them in Richmond it would happen. The line has been stretched
until it is broken." On this melancholy ride the shattered and
ragged remnants of his army, still proud, hopeful, and defiant,
saluted him at every point with shouts of welcome, indicating
their undiminished admiration and confidence.

This was the first day of April. Not one day of rest had been
given these starving men to recover from the winter's trials and
sufferings, which have been so truthfully described by the
graphic pen of Dr. Henry Alexander White:

Winter poured down its snows and its sleets upon Lee's shelterless
men in the trenches. Some of them burrowed into the earth. Most of
them shivered over the feeble fires, kept burning along the lines.
Scanty and thin were the garments of these heroes. Most of them were
clad in mere rags. Gaunt famine oppressed them every hour. One
quarter of a pound of rancid bacon and a little meal was the daily
portion assigned to each man by the rules of the War Department. But
even this allowance failed when the railroads broke down and left the
bacon and the flour and the meal piled up beside the tracks in Georgia
and the Carolinas. One sixth of this daily ration was the allotment for a
considerable time, and very often the supply of bacon failed entirely . . . . .
With dauntless hearts these gaunt-faced men endured the almost
ceaseless fire of Grants mortar-batteries. The frozen fingers of Lee's
army of sharpshooters clutched the musket barrel with an aim so
steady that Grant's men scarcely ever lifted their heads from their bomb-proofs.

These men--less than 40,000 in number--had held for many
months a battle-line forty miles long, stretching from the
Chickahominy to Hatcher's Run. My own corps was stretched
until the men stood like a row of vedettes, fifteen feet apart, in
the trenches. Portions of my line--it was not a line; it was the
mere skeleton of a line--had been broken by assaults at daybreak
on April 2. There were no troops--not a man--in reserve to help
us; but no extremity appalled my grim and gaunt-visaged fighters.
At the command they assembled at double quick in more
compact lines around those points which had been seized and
were still held by the Federals, densely packed in the captured
intrenchments. By desperate charges, one after another of these
breaches in my line was restored, until but one remained in
possession of the enemy. I was in the act of concentrating for a
supreme effort to restore this last breach, when Colonel Charles
Marshall of General Lee's staff reached me with a message
from the commander-in-chief. It was to admonish me of the dire
disaster at Five Forks on the extreme right flank of our army, of
the approach of the triumphant and overwhelming Union forces
in rear of our defences, of the forced abandonment by A. P. Hill
of his works, and of the death of that superb officer. In the face
of this almost complete crushing of every command defending
the entire length of our lines on my right, the restoration of the
remaining breach in my front could contribute nothing toward the
rescue of Lee's army. He, therefore, directed that I sacrifice no
more men in the effort to recover entire control of my works, but
that I maintain my compact line around this last breach, prevent,
if possible, Grant's effort to send through it his forces into the
city, and at any sacrifice bold my position until night, and until all
the other commands could be withdrawn. When this withdrawal
had been accomplished, my command was to silently evacuate

Petersburg, and cover the retreat of Lee's brave but shattered
little army.

The indomitable spirit of my men was never more strikingly
shown than in their cheerful response to this command. I feel
constrained at this point to place upon record the fact that these
were the same men who scarcely one week before had made
the daring plunge in the darkness which resulted in the capture
of Fort Stedman and its flanking lines; the same men who on the
first day at Gettysburg had turned the tide of battle; who at
sunset on the 6th of May, in the Wilderness, had carried dismay
to the right flank of the Federal army; who at Spottsylvania had
made the furious countercharge under the eye of Lee; who at
Cedar Creek had rushed upon Sheridan's left with resistless
momentum, and to whom I have endeavored to do but simple
justice in my account of the oscillating fortunes of the two
armies on that field. They were the men whose record will
brighten for all time every page of the history of that immortal
army which a knightly and able Federal soldier has pronounced
"the best which has existed on this continent." In a paper read
before the Military Historical Society of Massachusetts, General
Charles A. Whittier of the Union army says:

The Army of Northern Virginia will deservedly rank as the best
which has existed on this continent. Suffering privations unknown to
its opponents, it fought well from the early Peninsula days to the
surrender of that small remnant at Appomattox.
It seemed always ready, active, mobile. Without doubt, it was
composed of the best men of the South, rushing to what they
considered the defence of their country against a bitter invader; and
they took the places assigned them, officer or private, and fought until
beaten by superiority of numbers. The North sent no such army to the
field, and its patriotism was of easier character, etc.

As a matter of comparison, we have lately read that from
William and Mary College, Virginia, thirty-two out of thirty-five
professors and instructors abandoned the college work and
joined the army in the field. Harvard College sent one professor
from its large corps of professors and instructors.

In every Southern State the universities and colleges sent to
the front their students and the flower of their alumni as
volunteers. It is stated that nine tenths of the students of the
University of Virginia enlisted for the war. In the Rockbridge
battery there were seven masters of arts of the university,
twenty-eight college graduates, and twenty-five theological
students. Among these privates was R. E. Lee, Jr., son of the
great commander.

On my staff as volunteer aide was Professor Basil A.
Gildersleeve of the University of Virginia, now of Johns Hopkins
University. Dr. Gildersleeve has no superior in the country as a
Greek scholar, and is one of the most distinguished of our
classical writers. He was a most efficient officer, and exhibited
in extreme peril a high order of courage and composure. While
bearing an order in battle he was desperately wounded and
maimed for life.

These and many similar facts which could be given
demonstrate the justice of General Whittier's estimate.

General Grant, in this last movement upon our lines at
Petersburg, hurled against us his army of 124,000 1 brave and
superbly equipped soldiers. To resist them General Lee could
then bring into line about 35,000 worn and wan but consecrated
fighters. Possibly one half of these had been, on the 1st and 2d
of April, killed, wounded, and captured, or the commands to
which they belonged had been so broken to pieces as to
eliminate them from the effective forces. There was no hope for
us except in retreat.

1 These
figures are taken from the "Confederate Military History,"
Vol. III, p. 531.

Under orders from the general-in-chief, the old corps of
Stonewall Jackson, which it was my privilege to command, was
the last of his army to abandon forever those mortar-battered
lines of defence around Petersburg. After the hour of midnight,
when all other troops were safely on the march to the rear, the
Second Army Corps silently and sadly withdrew from the blood-stained
trenches in which Lee's peerless army had exhibited for
nine weary months a patience in suffering, a steadfastness under
discouraging conditions, and a strength in resistance unexampled
in war.

As the last broken file of that matchless army stepped from
the bridge and my pioneer corps lighted the flames that
consumed it, there came to me a vivid and depressing realization
of the meaning of the appalling tragedy of the last two days. The
breaking of Lee's power had shattered the last hope of Southern
independence. But another burden-- personal woe--was
weighing upon me. I had left behind me in that city of gloom the
wife who had followed me during the entire war. She was ill.
But as I rode away from Petersburg during the dismal hours of
that night, I found comfort in the hope that some chivalric
soldier of the Union army would learn of her presence and guard
her home against all intruders. My confidence in American
manhood was not misplaced.

To bring up the rear and adequately protect the retreating
army was an impossible task. With characteristic vigor General
Grant pressed the pursuit. Soon began the continuous and final
battle. Fighting all day, marching all night, with exhaustion and
hunger claiming their victims at every mile of the march, with
charges of infantry in rear and of cavalry on the flanks, it
seemed the war god had turned loose all his furies to revel in
havoc. On and on, hour after hour, from hilltop to hilltop, the
lines were alternately forming, fighting, and retreating, making
one almost continuous shifting battle.

Here, in one direction, a battery of artillery became involved;
there, in another, a blocked ammunition train required rescue:
and thus came short but sharp little battles which made up the
side shows of the main performance, while the different
divisions of Lee's lionhearted army were being broken and
scattered or captured. Out of one of these whirlwinds there
came running at the top of his speed a boy soldier whose wit
flashed out even in that dire extremity. When asked why he was
running, he shouted back:

"Golly, captain, I 'm running cause I can't fly!"

On the night of the 6th of April, three days before the final
surrender, my superb scout, young George of Virginia, who
recently died in Danville, greatly honored and loved by his people,
brought to me under guard two soldiers dressed in full
Confederate uniform, whom he had arrested on suspicion,
believing that they belonged to the enemy. About two months
prior to this arrest I had sent George out of Petersburg on a most
perilous mission. All of his scouting was full of peril. I directed
him to go in the rear of General Grant's lines, to get as close as
he could to the general's headquarters, and, if possible, catch
some one with despatches, or in some way bring me reliable
information as to what was being done by the Union commander.
George was remarkably conscientious, intelligent, and accurate in
his reports. He always wore his Confederate gray jacket, which
would protect him from the penalty of death as a spy if he should
be captured. But he also wore, when on his scouting expeditions,
a pale blue overcoat captured from the Union army. A great
many of our soldiers wore these overcoats because they had no
others.

On this particular expedition George was hiding in the woods
not far from General Grant's headquarters, when he saw
passing near him two men in Confederate uniform. It was late in
the evening, nearly dark. He

at once made himself known to them, supposing that, they were
scouting for some other corps in Lee's army. But they were
Sheridan's men, belonging to his "Jessie scouts," and they
instantly drew their revolvers upon George and marched him to
General Grant's headquarters. He was closely questioned by the
Union commander; but he was too intelligent to make any
mistakes in his answers. He showed his gray jacket, which
saved him from execution as a spy, and he was placed in the
guard-house. His opportunity for escape came late one night,
when he found a new recruit on guard at his prison door. This
newly enlisted soldier was a foreigner, and had very little
knowledge of the English language; but he knew what a twenty-dollar
gold piece was. The Confederacy did not have much gold,
but our scouts were kept supplied with it. George pulled out of
the lining of his jacket the gold piece, placed it in the foreigner's
hand, turned the fellow's back to the door,, and walked quickly
out of the guard-house. George would not have dared to attempt
such a programme with an American on guard.

He reached our lines, and reported these details only a few
days before our last retreat was begun. During that retreat on the
night of April 6, 1865, as I rode among my men, he brought two
soldiers under guard to me, and said: "General, here are two men
who are wearing our uniforms and say they belong to Fitzhugh
Lee's cavalry; but I believe they are Yankees. I had them placed
under guard for you to examine."

I questioned the men closely, and could find no sufficient
ground for George's suspicions. They seemed entirely self-possessed
and at ease under my rigid examination. They gave
me the names of Fitzhugh Lee's regimental and company
commanders, said they belonged to a certain mess, and gave the
names of the members, and, without a moment's hesitation, gave

prompt answer to every question I asked. I said to George that
they seemed to me all right; but he protested, saying: "No,
general, they are not all right. I saw them by the starlight
counting your files." One of them at once said: "Yes; we were
trying to get some idea of your force. We have been at home on
sick-leave for a long time, and wanted to know if we had any
army left." This struck me as a little suspicious, and I pounded
them again with questions. "You say that you have been home
on sick-leave?"

"Yes, sir; we have been at home several weeks, and fell in
with your command to-night, hoping that you could tell us how to
get to General Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry."

"If you have been at home sick, you ought to have your
furloughs with you."

"We have, sir. We have our furlough papers here in our
pockets, signed by our own officers, and approved by General R.
E. Lee. If we had a light you could examine them and see that
they are all right."

George, who was listening to this conversation, which
occurred while we were riding, again insisted that it did not
matter what these men said or what they had; they were
Yankees. I directed that they be brought on under guard until I
could examine their papers.

We soon came to a burning log heap on the roadside, which
had been kindled by some of the troops who had passed at an
earlier hour of the night. The moment the full light fell upon their
faces, George exclaimed: "General, these are the two men who
captured me nearly two months ago behind General Grant's
headquarters."

They ridiculed the suggestion, and at once drew from their
pockets the furloughs. These papers seemed to be correct, and
the signatures of the officers, including that of General Lee,
seemed to be genuine. This evidence did not yet satisfy George
nor shake his convictions.

He said that the signatures of our officers were forged, or these
men had captured some of our men who had furloughs, and had
taken the papers from them, and were now personating the real
owners. He asked me to make them dismount, that he might "go
through them," as he described his proposed search. He fingered
every seam in their coats, took off their cavalry sabres, and
searched their garments, but found nothing. At last he asked me
to make them sit down and let him pull off their boots. One
personated a Confederate private; the other wore the uniform of
a lieutenant of cavalry. George drew the boots from the
lieutenant's feet, and under the lining of one he found an order
from General Grant to General Ord, directing the latter to move
rapidly by certain roads and cut off Lee's retreat at Appomattox.
As soon as this order was found, the young soldier admitted the
truth of George's statement--that they were the two men who
captured him behind Grant's lines. I said to them: "Well, you
know your fate. Under the laws of war you have forfeited your
lives by wearing this uniform, and I shall have you shot at sunrise
to-morrow morning!"

They received this announcement without the slightest
appearance of nervousness. The elder could not have been more
than nineteen or twenty years of age, while his companion was a
beardless youth. One of them said with perfect composure:
"General, we understand it all. We knew when we entered this
kind of service, and put on these uniforms, that we were taking
our lives in our hands, and that we should be executed if we
were captured. You have the right to have us shot; but the war
can't last much longer, and it would do you no good to have us
killed."

I had no thought of having them executed, but I did not tell
them so. I sent the captured order to General Lee, and at four
o'clock on the morning of the 7th he

wrote me in pencil a note which was preserved by my chief of
staff, Major R. W. Hunter, now of Alexandria, Virginia. It was
sent, a few years ago, to Mrs. Gordon, to be kept by her as a
memento of this most remarkable incident. Unhappily, it was lost
in the fire which, in 1899, consumed my home. In that brief
note, General Lee directed me to march by certain roads toward
Appomattox as rapidly as the physical condition of my men
would permit. Thus, by General Lee's direction, my command
was thrown to the front, that we might thwart, if possible, the
purpose of the Union commander to check at Appomattox our
retrograde movement.

General Lee approved my suggestion to spare the lives of
Sheridan's captured "Jessie scouts," and directed me to bring
them along with my command. This incident closed with my
delivery of the young soldiers to General Sheridan on the
morning of Lee's surrender.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE SURRENDER

The Army of Northern Virginia reduced to a skeleton--General Lee's calm
bearing--The last Confederate council of war--Decision upon a final
attempt to break Grant's lines--The last charge of the war--Union
breastworks carried--A fruitless victory--Flag of truce sent to General
Ord--Conference with General Sheridan--An armistice.

BEFORE reaching the end of our journey, which terminated
abruptly at the little village of Appomattox, the Army of
Northern Virginia had become the mere skeleton of its former
self. At Sailor's Creek, Anderson's corps was broken and
destroyed, and General Ewell, with almost his entire command,
was captured, as was General Kershaw, General Custis Lee,
son of the general-in-chief, and other prominent officers. I had
discovered the movement threatening Ewell, and had sought to
apprise him of his danger and to aid in his escape; but my own
command was assailed at almost the same instant, and was
precipitated into a short but strenuous battle for its own safety.
The advance of Grant's army struck Ewell upon one road and
my command upon another almost simultaneously. Rushing
through the broad gap between Ewell and myself, the heavy
Federal force soon surrounded the command of that brave old
one-legged hero, and forced him to surrender. Another Union
column struck my command while we were endeavoring to push
the ponderous wagon-trains through the bog, out of which the
starved teams were unable to

drag them. Many of these wagons, loaded with ammunition,
mired so deep in the mud that they had to be abandoned. It was
necessary to charge and force back the Union lines in order to
rescue my men from this perilous position. Indeed, not only was
my command in almost incessant battle as we covered the
retreat, but every portion of our marching column was being
assailed by Grant's cavalry and infantry. The roads and fields
and woods swarmed with eager pursuers, and Lee now and then
was forced to halt his whole army, reduced to less than 10,000
fighters, in order to meet these simultaneous attacks. Various
divisions along the line of march turned upon the Federals, and in
each case checked them long enough for some other
Confederate commands to move on. Mahone's infantry and
Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry were engaged far in advance. The latter
command captured General Gregg, who, with other prisoners,
joined our retreat. I observed General Gregg marching on foot,
and asked him to accept a mount, as he was not accustomed to
travelling as an infantry soldier. He expressed appreciation of
the offer, but declined, preferring to share the fate of his men.

General Lee was riding everywhere and watching everything,
encouraging his brave men by his calm and cheerful bearing. He
was often exposed to great danger from shells and bullets; but,
in answer to protests, his reply was that he was obliged to see
for himself what was going on. As he sat on his horse near
Farmville during a sharp engagement, watching the effect of the
fire from one of our batteries which was playing upon the
enemy, a staff officer rode up to him with a message. The
general noticed that this officer had exposed himself
unnecessarily in approaching him, and he reprimanded the young
soldier for not riding on the side of the hill where he would be
protected from the enemy's fire. The young officer replied that
he would be

ashamed to seek protection while the commanding general was
so exposing himself. General Lee sharply replied: "It is my duty
to be here. Go back the way I told you, sir."

Thus the great chieftain was teaching by example the
lesson of devotion to duty at any risk, and teaching by
precept that noblest of lessons, unselfish consideration
for others.

This was no new phase of his soldier life. It was not an
exhibition of attributes developed by the trying conditions around
him. It was simply a natural expression of the spirit that made
him great and good. Many incidents in his army career illustrate
the same elements of character. At some point below Richmond,
he was standing near a battery, when the men crowded around
him, evidencing their admiration and affection. The group grew
so large as to attract the enemy's attention, and drew a heavy
fire; whereupon the general said to the privates around him:
"Men, you had better go back to your places. They are firing at
this point, and you are exposing yourselves to unnecessary
danger." He remained there himself for some minutes, and then,
as he walked quietly away, he picked up a small object and
placed it on the limb of a tree. It was afterward ascertained that
it was an unfledged sparrow that had fallen from its nest.

In the Wilderness, at Spottsylvania, and along the lines at
Petersburg, he exposed himself whenever and wherever his
presence seemed needful. The protests of his officers and
soldiers against this habit were so frequent that he said on one
occasion, half humorously, half complainingly: "I do wish
somebody would tell me where my place is on the field of battle;
wherever I go to look after the fight, I am told,'This is no place
for you; you must go away.' "

Ben," as he was familarly called during his service as member
of Congress from the Buckeye State) gave me,
after the war, an account of an incident occurring on this final
retreat which was both pathetic and amusing. It illustrates that
remarkable and unique phase of the great struggle, the feeling
of genuine comradeship, which existed between the soldiers of
the hostile armies. On that doleful retreat of Lee's army, it was
impossible for us to bury our dead or carry with us the disabled
wounded. There was no longer any room in the crowded
ambulances which had escaped capture and still accompanied
our trains. We could do nothing for the unfortunate sufferers
who were too severely wounded to march, except leave them
on the roadside with canteens of water. A big-hearted soldier-boy
in blue came across a desperately wounded Confederate
shot through legs and body, lying in his bloody bed of leaves,
groaning with pain and sighing for relief in death. The generous
Federal was so moved by the harrowing spectacle that he
stopped at the side of the Confederate and asked: "What can I
do for you, Johnny? I want to help you if I can."

"Thank you for your sympathy," the sufferer replied,
"but no one can help me now. It will not be long till death
relieves me."

The Union soldier bade him good-by, and was in the act of
leaving, when the wounded Southerner called to him: "Yes,
Yank; there is something you might do for me. You might pray
for me before you go."

This Union boy had probably never uttered aloud a word of
prayer in all his life. But his emotions were deeply stirred, and
through his tears he looked around for some one more
accustomed to lead in prayer. Discovering some of his
comrades passing, he called to them: "Come here, boys, and
come quick. Here is a poor Johnny shot all to pieces, and he 's
dying. One

of you must come and pray for him. He wants me to pray for
him; but you know I can't pray worth a - - - - -."

Two days before the surrender, a number of officers held a
council as to what was best to be done. I was not present, but I
learned through others that three propositions were discussed:

1. To disband and allow the troops to get away as best they
could, and reform at some designated point.

This was abandoned because a dispersion over the country
would be a dreadful infliction upon our impoverished people, and
because it was most improbable that all the men would reach
the rallying-point.

2. To abandon all trains, and concentrate the entire
Confederate army in a compact body, and cut through Grant's
lines.

This proposition was in turn discarded, because without
ammunition trains we could not hope to continue the struggle
many days.

3. To surrender at once.

It was decided that this last course would be wisest, and these
devoted officers felt that they should do all in their power to
relieve General Lee by giving him their moral support in taking
the step. General Grant had not then written his first note to Lee,
asking surrender. General Pendleton, who was the Confederate
chief of artillery, and a close personal friend of the commander,
was selected by the council to acquaint him with the result of its
deliberations. General Pendleton gave a most graphic description
of his interview with General Lee. He said that the general-in-chief
instantly replied:

"Oh, no. I trust it has not come to that. We have too many
bold men to think of laying down our arms."

General Pendleton related that the general referred to the
beginning of the Southern struggle for independence, and said, in
substance, that he had never believed that, with the vast power
against us, we could win our independence

unless we were aided by foreign powers. "But,"
added General Lee, "such considerations really made no
difference with me." And then he uttered those memorable
words: "We had, I was satisfied, sacred principles to maintain
and rights to defend, for which we were in duty bound to do our
best, even if we perished in the endeavor."

This great soldier understood the spirit which led the officers
in that conference to recommend his surrender. He knew their
devotion to the cause and their devotion to him, but he was not
ready to consider the necessity for surrender. He doubtless had
this conference in mind later, when he perpetrated upon General
Wise the joke which General Long has recorded. General Wise,
in the absence of either basin or towel, had washed his face in a
pool of water impregnated with red clay. The water dried,
leaving the red stains on his countenance. General Lee was
much amused at the grotesque appearance of Wise, and saluted
him as he approached:

"Good morning, General Wise. I perceive that you, at any
rate, have not given up the contest, as you are in your war-paint
this morning."

In his report written three days after the surrender, and
addressed to "His Excellency, Jefferson Davis," General Lee
states that when we reached Appomattox his army had been
"reduced to two corps under Longstreet and Gordon." He also
says in that report: "On the morning of the 9th, according to the
reports of the ordnance officers, there were 7892 organized
infantry with arms."

On the evening of April 8th, this little army, with its
ammunition nearly exhausted, was confronted by the forces of
General Grant, which had been thrown across our line of retreat
at Appomattox. Then came the last sad Confederate council of
war. It was called by Lee to meet at night. It met in the woods
at his headquarters

and by a low-burning bivouac-fire. There was no tent there, no
table, no chairs, and no camp-stools. On blankets spread upon
the ground or on saddles at the roots of the trees, we sat around
the great commander. A painter's brush might transfer to canvas
the physical features of that scene, but no tongue or pen will
ever be able to describe the unutterable anguish of Lee's
commanders as they looked into the clouded face of their
beloved leader and sought to draw from it some ray of hope.

There were present at this final council the general-in-chief,
the commander of his artillery, General Pendleton; General
Fitzhugh Lee, who in the absence of Wade Hampton
commanded the cavalry, and General Longstreet and myself,
commanding all that was left of his immortal infantry. These
fragments of each arm of the service still represented the
consecration and courage that had made Lee's army, at the
meridian of its power, almost invincible.

The numbers and names of the staff officers who were
present I cannot now recall; and it would be as impossible to
give the words that were spoken or the suggestions that were
made as it would to photograph the thoughts and emotions of
that soldier group gathered at Lee's last bivouac. The letters of
General Grant asking surrender, and the replies thereto, evoked
a discussion as to the fate of the Southern people and the
condition in which the failure of our cause would leave them.
There was also some discussion as to the possibility of forcing a
passage through Grant's lines and saving a small portion of the
army, and continuing a desultory warfare until the government at
Washington should grow weary and grant to our people peace,
and the safeguards of local self-government. If all that was said
and felt at that meeting could be given it would make a volume
of measureless pathos. In no hour of the great war did

General Lee's masterful characteristics appear to me so
conspicuous as they did in that last council. We knew by our
own aching hearts that his was breaking. Yet he commanded
himself, and stood calmly facing and discussing the long-dreaded
inevitable.

It was finally determined that with Fitz Lee's cavalry, my
infantry, and Long's artillery, under Colonel Thomas H. Carter,
we should attempt at daylight the next morning to cut through
Grant's lines. Longstreet was to follow in support of the
movement.

The utmost that could be hoped for was that we might reach
the mountains of Virginia and Tennessee with a remnant of the
army, and ultimately join General Johnston. As we rode away
from the meeting I directed a staff officer to return to General
Lee and ask him if he had any specific directions as to where I
should halt and camp for the night. He said: "Yes; tell General
Gordon that I should be glad for him to halt just beyond the
Tennessee line." That line was about two hundred miles away,
and Grant's battle-lines and breastworks were in our immediate
front, ready to check any movement in that direction; but
General Lee knew that I would interpret his facetious message
exactly as he intended it. His purpose was to let me infer that
there was little hope of our escape and that it did not matter
where I camped for the night; but if we should succeed in cutting
our way out, he expected me to press toward the goal in the
mountains.

The Federals had constructed a line of breastworks across
our front during the night. The audacious movement of our
troops was begun at dawn. The dashing cavalry leader, Fitzhugh
Lee, swept around the Union left flank, while the infantry and
artillery attacked the front. I take especial pride in recording the
fact that this last charge of the war was made by the footsore
and starving men of my command with a spirit worthy the

best days of Lee's army. The Union breastworks were carried.
Two pieces of artillery were captured. The Federals were
driven from all that portion of the field, and the brave boys in
tattered gray cheered as their battle-flags waved in triumph on
that last morning.

The Confederate battle-lines were still advancing when I
discovered a heavy column of Union infantry coming from the
right and upon my rear. I gathered around me my sharpshooters,
who were now held for such emergencies, and directed Colonel
Thomas H. Carter of the artillery to turn all his guns upon the
advancing column. It was held at bay by his shrapnel, grape, and
canister. While the Confederate infantry and cavalry were thus
fighting at the front, and the artillery was checking the
development of Federal forces around my right and rear,
Longstreet was assailed by other portions of the Federal army.
He was so hardly pressed that he could not join, as
contemplated, in the effort to break the cordon of men and metal
around us. At this critical juncture a column of Union cavalry
appeared on the hills to my left, headed for the broad space
between Longstreet's command and mine. In a few minutes that
body of Federal cavalry would not only have seized the trains
but cut off all communication between the two wings of Lee's
army and rendered its capture inevitable. I therefore detached a
brigade to double-quick and intercept this Federal force.

Such was the situation, its phases rapidly shifting and growing
more intensely thrilling at each moment, when I received a
significant inquiry from General Lee. It was borne by Colonel
Charles S. Venable of his staff, afterward the chairman of the
faculty of the University of Virginia. The commander wished
me to report at once as to the conditions on my portion of the
field, what progress I was making, and what encouragement I
could give. I said: "Tell General Lee that my command has

been fought to a frazzle, and unless Longstreet can unite in the
movement, or prevent these forces from coming upon my rear, I
cannot long go forward." Colonel Venable has left on record
this statement:

"At three o'clock on the morning of that fatal day, General
Lee rode forward, still hoping that we might break through the
countless hordes of the enemy who hemmed us in. Halting a
short distance in rear of our vanguard, he sent me on to General
Gordon to ask him if he could cut through the enemy. I found
General Gordon and General Fitz Lee on their front line in the
light of the morning, arranging an attack. Gordon's reply to the
message (I give the expressive phrase of the Georgian) was
this:'Tell General Lee I have fought my corps to a frazzle, and I
fear I can do nothing unless I am heavily supported by
Longstreet's corps.' "

Colonel Venable adds that when General Lee received my
message, he said: "There is nothing left me but to go and see
General Grant, and I had rather die a thousand deaths."

My troops were still fighting, furiously fighting in nearly every
direction, when the final note from General Lee reached me. It
notified me that there was a flag of truce between General
Grant and himself, stopping hostilities, and that I could
communicate that fact to the commander of the Union forces in
my front. There was no unnecessary delay in sending that
message. I called Colonel Green Peyton of my staff, and
directed him to take a flag of truce and bear the message to
General Ord, who commanded, as I supposed, the Union
infantry in my front. I ordered him to say to the Union
commander this, and nothing more: "General Gordon has
received notice from General Lee of a flag of truce, stopping the
battle." Colonel Peyton soon informed me that we had no flag of
truce. I said: "Well, take your handkerchief and tie that on a
stick, and go."

"General, I have on a flannel shirt, and I see you have. I don't
believe there is a white shirt in the army."

"Get something, sir," I ordered. "Get something and go!"

He secured a rag of some sort, and rode rapidly away in
search of General Ord. He did not find Ord, but he found
Sheridan, and returned to me accompanied by an officer of
strikingly picturesque appearance. This Union officer was
slender and graceful, and a superb rider. He wore his hair very
long, falling almost to his shoulders. Guided by my staff officer,
he galloped to where I was sitting on my horse, and, with
faultless grace and courtesy, saluted me with his sabre and said:

"I am General Custer, and bear a message to you from
General Sheridan. The general desires me to present to you his
compliments, and to demand the immediate and unconditional
surrender of all the troops under your command.["] I replied:
"You will please, general, return my compliments to General Sheridan,
and say to him that I shall not surrender my command."

"He directs me to say to you, general, if there is any
hesitation about your surrender, that he has you surrounded and
can annihilate your command in an hour."

To this I answered that I was probably as well aware of my
situation as was General Sheridan; that I had nothing to add to
my message informing him of the contents of the note from
General Lee; that if General Sheridan decided to continue the
fighting in the face of the flag of truce, the responsibility for the
blood shed would be his and not mine.

In a short time thereafter a white flag was seen approaching.
Under it was Philip Sheridan, accompanied

by a mounted escort almost as large as one of Fitz Lee
regiments. Sheridan was mounted on an enormous horse, a very
handsome animal. He rode in front of the escort, and an orderly
carrying the flag rode beside him. Around me at the time were
my faithful sharp shooters, and as General Sheridan and his
escort cam within easy range of the rifles, a half-witted fellow
raise his gun as if to fire. I ordered him to lower his gun, and
explained that he must not fire on a flag of truce. He did not
obey my order cheerfully, but held his rifle in position to be
quickly thrown to his shoulder. In fact, he was again in the act of
raising his gun to fire a Sheridan, when I caught the gun and
said to him, with emphasis, that he must not shoot men under
flag of truce. He at once protested: "Well, general, let him stay
on his own side."

I did not tell General Sheridan of his narrow escape. Had he
known the facts,--that this weak-minded but strong-hearted
Confederate private was one of the deadliest of marksmen,--
he probably would have realized that I had saved his life.

Meantime another member of my staff, Major R. W Hunter of
Virginia, had ridden off with General Custer, who asked to be
guided to Longstreet's position. As General Sheridan, with the
flag of truce, came nearer, I rode out to meet him. Between
General Sheridan and myself occurred another controversy very
similar to the one I had had previously with General Custer. No
message from General Grant in reference to the truce between
the commanders-in-chief had reached General Sheridan. It had
miscarried. But upon my exhibiting to him the note from Lee, he
at once proposed that the firing cease and that our respective
lines be withdrawn to certain positions, while we waited further
intelligence from the commanders of the two armies. Our
respective staff officers were despatched to inaugurate this
temporary

armistice, and Sheridan and I dismounted and sat together on
the ground.

Quickly the firing was stopped and silence reigned on the
field. But I had forgotten the brigade which I had sent far off to
my left to check the movement of Union cavalry, and as General
Sheridan and I sat and conversed, a sudden roll of musketry was
heard from that quarter. General Sheridan sprang to his feet and
fiercely asked: "What does that mean, sir?" I replied: "It is
my fault, general. I had forgotten that brigade. But let me stop
the firing first, and then I will explain."

I called for a member of my staff to ride with all speed to that
brigade. None of my staff was there. They had not returned
from executing my previous orders. General Sheridan proposed
to lend me one of his staff. I accepted the offer; and it so
happened that a Union officer, Captain Vanderbilt Allen, bore
the last order to my troops, directing them to cease firing, thus
practically ending the four years of battle for Southern
independence. It was necessary, however, to protect Captain
Allen from the fire of my men or from their demand for his
surrender. For this purpose I sent with him as guide and
protector one of my ragged privates. That private had belonged
to the old Stonewall Brigade.

I had never seen General Sheridan before, nor received from
those who knew him any definite impressions of him as man or
soldier. I had seen something of his work in the latter capacity
during the campaigns in the Valley of Virginia. His destruction of
barns and mills and farming implements impressed me as in
conflict with the laws of war and inconsistent with the
enlightened, Christian sentiment of the age, and had prepared me
in a measure for his somewhat brusque manners. Truth demands
that I say of General Sheridan that his style of conversation and
general bearing, while never discourteous, were far less
agreeable and pleasing than those of

any other officer of the Union army whom it was my
fortune to meet. I do not recall a word he said which I
could regard as in any degree offensive, but there was an
absence of that delicacy and consideration which was
exhibited by other Union officers.

General Sheridan began the conversation after we had
dismounted by saying, in substance: "We have met before, I
believe, at Winchester and Cedar Creek in the Valley."

I replied that I was there, and he continued: "I had the
pleasure of receiving some artillery from your Government,
consigned to me through your commander, General Early."

He referred, of course, to the piece on which the Confederate
wag had painted in white letters the words given in a former
chapter. There was nothing offensive in that; but I thought there
was in his manner a slight tinge of exultation which was not
altogether pleasing, and I replied:

"That is true; and I have this morning received from your
government artillery consigned to me through General
Sheridan."

He evidently did not know that within the previous hour we
had captured some of his artillery, and he was reluctant to
believe it.

The meeting of Lee and Grant, and the impressive formalities
which followed, put an end to the interview, and we parted
without the slightest breach of strict military courtesy.

CHAPTER XXX

THE END OF THE WAR

Appomattox--25,000 men surrender--Only 8000 able
to bear arms--Uniform courtesy of the victorious Federals--A
salute for the
vanquished--What Lincoln might have done--General Sherman's
liberal terms to
Johnston--An estimate of General Lee and General Grant--The war
and the reunited
country.

GENERAL LONGSTREET'S forces and mine at Appomattox,
numbered, together, less than 8000 men; but every man able to
bear arms was still resolute and ready for battle. There were
present three times that many enrolled Confederates; but two
thirds of them were so enfeebled by hunger, so wasted by
sickness, and so foot-sore from constant marching that it was
difficult for them to keep up with the army. They were wholly
unfit for duty. It is important to note this fact as explaining the
great difference in the number of those who fought and those
who were to be fed. At the final meeting between General Lee
and General Grant rations were ordered by General Grant for
25,000 Confederates.

Marked consideration and courtesy were exhibited at
Appomattox by the victorious Federals, from the commanding
generals to the privates in the ranks. General Meade, who had
known General Lee in the old army, paid, after the surrender, an
unofficial visit to the Confederate chieftain. After cordial
salutations, General Lee said playfully to his former comrade in
arms that years were telling upon him. General Meade, who had

fought Lee at Gettysburg and in many subsequent battles, made
the strikingly gracious and magnanimous answer: "Not years, but
General Lee himself has made me gray."

Some of the scenes on the field, immediately after the
cessation of hostilities and prior to the formal surrender, illustrate
the same magnanimous spirit, and were peculiarly impressive and
thrilling. As my command, in worn-out shoes and ragged
uniforms, but with proud mien, moved to the designated point to
stack their arms and surrender their cherished battle-flags, they
challenged the admiration of the brave victors. One of the
knightliest soldiers of the Federal army, General Joshua L.
Chamberlain of Maine, who afterward served with distinction as
governor of his State, called his troops into line, and as my men
marched in front of them, the veterans in blue gave a soldierly
salute to those vanquished heroes--a token of respect from
Americans to Americans, a final and fitting tribute from Northern
to Southern chivalry.

General Chamberlain describes this incident in the following
words:

At the sound of that machine-like snap of arms, General Gordon
started, caught in a moment its significance, and instantly assumed the
finest attitude of a soldier. He wheeled his horse, facing me, touching
him gently with the spur, so that the animal slightly reared, and, as he
wheeled, horse and rider made one motion, the horse's head swung
down with a graceful bow, and General Gordon dropped his sword-point
to his toe in salutation.

By word of mouth the general sent back orders to the rear that his
own troops take the same position of the manual in the march past as
did our line. That was done, and a truly imposing sight was the mutual
salutation and farewell.

Bayonets were affixed to muskets, arms stacked, and cartridge-boxes
unslung and hung upon the stacks. Then, slowly

and with a reluctance that was appealingly pathetic, the torn and
tattered battle-flags were either leaned against the stacks or laid upon
the ground. The emotion of the conquered soldiery was really sad to
witness. Some of the men who had carried and followed those ragged
standards through the four long years of strife rushed, regardless of all
discipline, from the ranks, bent about their old flags, and pressed them
to their lips.

And it can well be imagined, too, that there was no lack of emotion
on our side, but the Union men were held steady in their lines, without
the least show of demonstration by word or by motion. There was,
though, a twitching of the muscles of their faces, and, be it said, their
battle-bronzed cheeks were not altogether dry. Our men felt the import
of the occasion, and realized fully how they would have been affected
if defeat and surrender had been their lot after such a fearful struggle.1

1 New York "Times," May 4, 1901.

When the proud and sensitive sons of Dixie came to a full
realization of the truth that the Confederacy was overthrown
and their leader had been compelled to surrender his once
invincible army, they could no longer
control their emotions, and tears ran like water down their
shrunken faces. The flags which they still carried were objects
of undisguised affection. These Southern banners had gone
down before overwhelming numbers; and torn by shells, riddled
by bullets, and laden with the powder and smoke of battle, they
aroused intense emotion in the men who had so often followed
them to victory. Yielding to overpowering sentiment, these high-mettled
men began to tear the flags from the staffs and hide
them in their bosoms, as they wet them with
burning tears.

The Confederate officers faithfully endeavored to check
this exhibition of loyalty and love for the old flags. A great
majority of them were duly surrendered; but many were secretly
carried by devoted veterans to their

There was nothing unnatural or censurable in all this. The
Confederates who clung to those pieces of battered bunting knew
they would never again wave as martial ensigns above
embattled hosts; but they wanted to keep them, just as they
wanted to keep the old canteen with a bullet-hole through it, or
the rusty gray jacket that had been torn by canister. They loved
those flags, and will love them forever, as mementoes of the
unparalleled struggle. They cherish them because they represent
the consecration and courage not only of Lee's army but of all the
Southern armies, because they symbolize the bloodshed and the
glory of nearly a thousand battles.

Some narrow but very good and patriotic people object to this
expression of Southern sentiment. It was not so, however, with
William McKinley, that typical American, who, while living and
while dying, exhibited in their fulness and strength the virtues of a
true and lofty manhood. That chivalric Union soldier, far-seeing
statesman, and truly great President saw in this Southern fidelity
to past memories the surest pledge of loyalty to future duties.
William McKinley fought as bravely as the bravest on the Union
side; but he was broad enough to recognize in his Southern
countrymen a loyal adherence to the great fundamental truths to
which both sides were devoted. He was too wise and too just to
doubt the South's fealty to the Constitution or to the doctrines of
the Declaration of Independence;
for Madison was father of the one and Jefferson of the other.
He was great enough to trust implicitly the South's renewed
allegiance to the Union and its flag; for hers was the most liberal
hand in studding its field with stars. He did not hesitate to trust
Southern pluck and patriotism to uphold the honor of the country
and give liberty to Cuba; for he remembered Washington

and his rebels in the Revolution, Jackson and his Southern
volunteers at New Orleans; Zachary Taylor and his
Louisianians, Clay and his Kentuckians, Butler and his South
Carolinians, and Davis and his Mississippians in Mexico.

The heartstrings of the mother, woven around the grave of her
lost child, will never be severed while she lives; but does that
hinder the continued flow of maternal devotion to those who are
left her? The South's affections are bound, with links that cannot
be broken, around the graves of her sons who fell in her
defence, and to the mementoes and memories of the great
struggle; but does that fact lessen her loyalty to the proud
emblem of a reunited country? Does her unparalleled defence of
the now dead Confederacy argue less readiness to battle for this
ever-living Republic, in the making and the administering of
which she bore so conspicuous a part?

If those unhappy patriots who find a scarecrow in every
faded, riddled Confederate flag would delve deeper into the
philosophy of human nature, or rise higher,--say to the plane on
which McKinley stood,--they would be better satisfied with
their Southern countrymen, with Southern sentiment, with the
breadth and strength of the unobtrusive but sincere Southern
patriotism. They would see that man is so constituted--the
immutable laws of our being are such--that to stifle the sentiment
and extinguish the hallowed memories of a people is to destroy
their manhood.

During these last scenes at Appomattox some of the
Confederates were so depressed in spirit, so filled with
apprehensions as to the policy to be adopted by the civil
authorities at Washington, that the future seemed to them
shrouded in gloom. They knew that burnt homes and fenceless
farms, poverty and ashes, would greet them on their return from
the war. Even if the administration

at Washington should be friendly, they did not believe that the
Southern States could recover in half a century from the chaotic
condition in which the war had left them. The situation was
enough to daunt the most hopeful and appall the stoutest hearts.
"What are we to do? How are we to begin life again?" they
asked. "Every dollar of our circulating medium has been
rendered worthless. Our banks and rich men have no money.
The commodities and personal property which formerly gave us
credit have been destroyed. The Northern banks and money-lenders
will not take as security our lands, denuded of houses
and without animals and implements for their cultivation. The
railroads are torn up or the tracks are worn out. The negroes are
freed and may refuse to work. Besides, what assurance can we
have of law and order and the safety of our families with four
million slaves suddenly emancipated in the midst of us and the
restraints to which they have been accustomed entirely
removed?"

To many intelligent soldiers and some of the officers the
conditions were so discouraging, the gloom so impenetrable, that
they seriously discussed the advisability of leaving the country
and beginning life anew in some other land.

While recognizing the dire extremity which confronted us, I
was inclined to take a more hopeful view of the future. I
therefore spoke to the Southern soldiers on the field at
Appomattox, in order to check as best I could their disposition to
leave the country, and to counteract, if possible, the paralyzing
effect of the overwhelming discouragements which met them on
every side.

As we reached the designated point, the arms were stacked
and the battle-flags were folded. Those sad and suffering men,
many of them weeping as they saw the old banners laid upon
the stacked guns like trappings on

the coffin of their dead hopes, at once gathered in compact mass
around me. Sitting on my horse in the midst of them, I spoke to
them for the last time as their commander. In all my past life I
had never undertaken to speak where my own emotions were so
literally overwhelming. I counselled such course of action as I
believed most conducive to the welfare of the South and of the
whole country. I told them of my own grief, which almost stifled
utterance, and that I realized most keenly the sorrow that was
breaking their hearts, and appreciated fully the countless and
stupendous barriers across the paths they were to tread.

Reminding them of the benign Southern climate, of the fertility
of their lands, of the vastly increased demand for the South's
great staple and the high prices paid for it, I offered these facts
as legitimate bases of hope and encouragement. I said to them
that through the rifts in the clouds then above us I could see the
hand of Almighty God stretched out to help us in the impending
battle with adversity; that He would guide us in the gloom, and
bless every manly effort to bring back to desolated homes the
sunshine and comforts of former years. I told them the principles
for which they had so grandly fought and uncomplainingly
suffered were not lost,--could not be lost,--for they were the
principles on which the Fathers had built the Republic, and that
the very throne of Jehovah was pledged that truth should triumph
and liberty live. As to the thought of their leaving the country,
that must be abandoned. It was their duty as patriots to remain
and work for the recuperation of our stricken section with the
same courage, energy, and devotion with which they had fought
for her in war. I urged them to enter cheerfully and hopefully
upon the tasks imposed by the fortunes of war, obeying the laws,
and giving, as I knew they would, the same loyal support to the
general Government which they had

yielded to the Confederacy. I closed with a prophecy that passion
would speedily die, and that the brave and magnanimous soldiers
of the Union army, when disbanded and scattered among the
people, would become promoters of sectional peace and
fraternity.

That prophecy would have been speedily fulfilled but for the
calamitous fate that befell the country in the death of President
Lincoln; and even in spite of that great misfortune, we should
have much sooner reached the era of good-will and sectional
concord if the spirit of the soldiers who did the fighting had
animated the civilians who did the talking.

As I began to speak from my horse, large numbers of Union
soldiers came near to hear what I had to say, giving me a rather
queerly mixed audience. The Hon. Elihu Washburne, afterward
United States Minister to France, the close friend of both
President Lincoln and General Grant, was present at the
surrender, as the guest of the Union commander. He either
heard this parting speech or else its substance was reported to
him. As soon as the formalities were ended, he made himself
known to me, and in a most gracious manner expressed his
pleasure at the general trend of my remarks. He assured me
that the South would receive generous treatment at the hands of
the general Government. My special object in referring to Mr.
Washburne in this connection is to leave on record an emphatic
statement made by him which greatly encouraged me. I can
never forget his laconic answer to my inquiry: "Why do you
think, Mr. Washburne, that the South will be generously dealt
with by the Government?" "Because Abraham Lincoln is at its
head," was his reply.

I knew something of Mr. Lincoln's past history, of his lifelong
hostility to slavery, of his Emancipation Proclamation and
vigorous prosecution of the war; but I had no knowledge
whatever of any kindly sentiment entertained

by him toward the Southern people. The emphatic words
of Mr. Washburne, his intimate friend and counsellor, greatly
interested me. I was with Mr. Washburne for several
succeeding days--we rode on horseback together from
Appomattox back toward Petersburg; and his description of Mr.
Lincoln's character, of his genial and philanthropic nature,
accompanied with illustrative anecdotes, was not only extremely
entertaining, but was to me a revelation. He supported his
declaration as to Mr. Lincoln's kindly sentiments by giving an
elaborate and detailed account of his meeting with our
commissioners at Hampton Roads. He expressed the opinion
that the President went to that meeting with the fixed purpose of
ending the war by granting the most liberal terms, provided the
Southern commissioners acquiesced in the sine qua non--the
restoration of the Union.

We parted at Petersburg, and among the last things he
enjoined was faith in the kindly purposes of Abraham Lincoln in
reference to the Southern people. Mr. Washburne said that the
President would recommend to Congress such legislation as in
his opinion would promote the prosperity of the South. He was
emphatic in his declaration that Mr. Lincoln desired only the
restoration of the Union--that even the abolition of slavery was
secondary to this prime object. He stated that the President had
declared that if he could restore the Union without abolition, he
would gladly do it; if he could save the Union by partial abolition
of slavery, he would do it that way; but that if it became
necessary to abolish slavery entirely in order to save the Union,
then slavery would be abolished: that as his great object had
been achieved by the surrender of Lee's army, it would speedily
be known to the Southern people that the President was deeply
concerned for their welfare, that there would be no prosecutions
and no discriminations,

but that the State governments would be promptly recognized,
and every effort made to help the Southern people. These
impressive assurances were adding strength to my hopes when
the whole country was shocked by
the assassination of the President.

General Gibbon, General Griffin, and General Merritt were
appointed by General Grant to meet Generals Pendleton,
Longstreet, and myself, appointed by General Lee. The special
duty which devolved on these six officers was the discussion and
drafting of all details to carry out the formal surrender, according
to the general terms agreed upon by the commanders-in-chief.
In all our intercourse with those three Union officers I can recall
no expression or word that could possibly wound the sensibility
of a Confederate. Rejoiced as they naturally were at the
termination of the long and costly struggle, and at the ultimate
triumph of the Union cause, they scrupulously avoided allusions
to battles in which the Federal armies had been victors, and
endeavored rather to direct conversation to engagements in
which the Union forces had been vanquished. Indeed,
Confederate officers generally observed and commented upon
this spirit, which at that time seemed to actuate the privates as
well as the officers of the victorious army.

As the Confederates were taking leave of Appomattox, and
about to begin their long and dreary tramp homeward, many of
the Union men bade them cordial farewell. One of Grant's men
said good-naturedly to one of Lee's veterans:

"Well, Johnny, I guess you fellows will go home now to
stay."

The tired and tried Confederate, who did not clearly
understand the spirit in which these playful words were spoken,
and who was not at the moment in the best mood for badinage,
replied:

are going home to stay? Maybe we are. But don't be giving us
any of your impudence. If you do, we 'll come back and lick
you again."

Probably in no military organization that ever existed were
there such cordial relations between officers and private soldiers
as in the Confederate army. This was due, doubtless, to the fact
that in our ranks there were lawyers, teachers, bankers,
merchants, planters, college professors, and students who
afterward became chief justices, governors, and occupants of
the highest public stations. Since the war some of these privates
have told with great relish of the old farmer near Appomattox
who decided to give employment, after the surrender, to any of
Lee's veterans who might wish to work a few days for food and
small wages. He divided the Confederate employés into squads
according to the respective ranks held by them in the army. He
was uneducated, but entirely loyal to the Southern cause. A
neighbor inquired of him as to the different squads:

"Who are those men working over there?"

"Them is privates, sir, of Lee's army."

"Well, how do they work?"

"Very fine, sir; first-rate workers."

"Who are those in the second group?"

"Them is lieutenants and captains, and they works fairly well,
but not as good workers as the privates."

"I see you have a third squad: who are they?"

"Them is colonels."

"Well, what about the colonels? How do they work?"

"Now, neighbor, you 'll never hear me say one word ag'in'
any man who fit in the Southern army; but I ain't a-gwine to hire
no generals."

The paroles issued to the Confederates were carefully
examined by the possessors, and elicited a great variety of
comment. Each man's parole bore his name and the

name of his company and regiment, and recorded his pledge to
fight no more until he was regularly exchanged. A few hoped for
an early exchange and release from this pledge, that they might
continue the struggle with some organized force, operating in a
different section of the Confederacy. They were looking hopefully
to the Trans-Mississippi, where, even after the surrender of Lee
and Joe Johnston and Richard Taylor east of the Mississippi,
Generals Kirby Smith, Magruger, and Forney, with Simon Bolivar
Buckner as chief of staff, were still appealing to Confederates to
"stand to their colors." That gallant little army of the Trans-Mississippi
had fought many desperate battles under such leaders
as McCulloch, McIntosh, Ross, Green, Maxey, Waul, Price, Van
Dorn, Pike, Walker, Shelby, and W. L. Cabell, of whom General
Marmaduke wrote: "The élan and chivalrous bearing of Cabell
inspired all who looked upon him"; and these few unyielding spirits
at Appomattox were still panting for continued combat in the ranks
of those unsurrendered forces beyond the great Father of Waters.
The more thoughtful, however, knew that the war was over. They
carefully preserved their paroles, and were as proud of them as a
young graduate is of his diploma, because these strips of paper
furnished official proof of the fact that they were in the fight to the
last. This fact they transmit as a priceless legacy to their children.

When I returned to Petersburg from Appomattox, I found
Mrs. Gordon rapidly recovering, and as soon as she was able to
travel, in company with Captain James M. Pace of my staff and
his little family, who had joined him, we began our arduous trip
homeward, over broken railroads and in such dilapidated
conveyances as had been left in the track of the armies. In
Petersburg it was impossible to secure among the recently
emancipated negroes any one willing to accompany us as nurse

for our child. This fact imposed upon me the necessity of
continuing for a time my command of infantry in arms--a
situation more trying to me in some respects than the one from
which I had just been relieved by General Grant at Appomattox.

The generous terms of surrender given to Lee by Giant were
exceeded in liberality by those which W. T. Sherman offered to
Joseph E. Johnston in North Carolina. In the memorandum of
agreement between Generals Sherman and Johnston (April 18,
1865) occur the following items:

"The Confederate armies now in existence to be disbanded
and conducted to their State capitals, there to deposit their arms
and public property in the State arsenals," etc. The President of
the United States was to recognize the "several State
governments on their officers and legislatures taking the oaths
prescribed by the Constitution of the United States." The Federal
courts were to be reëstablished in the Southern States, the
people of the South were to be guaranteed their political rights,
and rights of person and property, with a general amnesty.
Briefly analyzed, these liberal terms meant that, with the
exception of slavery (nothing was said on that subject), the
Southern States and people were instantly to resume the
relations to the general Government which they had occupied
before the war began, and, instead of surrendering their arms,
were to deposit them in State arsenals for ready use in
suppressing riots, enforcing law, and protecting homes and
property.

These terms of surrender proposed by General Sherman
reveal a spirit in extreme contrast to that which he showed
toward the Southern people in his unobstructed march to the
sea. In his agreement with General Johnston his magnanimity is
scarcely paralleled by that of any victorious commander,
whereas in his long general

orders for the conduct of his troops on their travel from
demolished Atlanta to his goal by the sea, fully one half of his
words are directions for systematic "foraging," destruction of
"mills, houses, cotton-gins," etc., and for spreading "a devastation
more or less relentless" according to the hostility shown by
different localities on the line of his march. It is due to General
Sherman to say that he had his peculiar ideas of waging war and
making it "hell," but when it was over he declared, "It is our
solemn duty to protect and not to plunder."

The terms proposed by him to General Johnston were so
liberal that they were promptly rejected by the civil authorities at
Washington. Mr. Lincoln was dead and Andrew Johnson was
President; Mr. Stanton was Secretary of War, and General
Halleck ranked General Sherman in the field. This vindictive trio--
Johnson, Stanton, and Halleck--rejected General Sherman's
agreement with General Johnston; and Stanton and Halleck
sought to humiliate Sherman and, as he declared, to insult him.
In his "Memoirs" General Sherman writes: "To say that I was
angry at the tone and substance of these bulletins of the War
Department would hardly express my feelings. I was outraged
beyond measure, and was resolved to resent the insult, cost what
it might"; and he did resent it in the most emphatic manner. In
regard to the absurd report that Mr. Davis had carried out of
Richmond vast sums of money, General Sherman writes: "The
thirteen millions of treasure with which Jeff Davis was to
corrupt our armies and buy his escape dwindled down to the
contents of a hand-valise."

A great Frenchman pronounced the French Revolution an
"about-face of the universe." The meeting of Lee and Grant at
Appomattox was the momentous epoch of the century. It
marked greater changes, uprooted a grander and nobler
civilization, and, in the emancipation of one race and the
impoverishment of another, it involved

vaster consequences than had ever followed the fall of a
dynasty or the wreck of an empire. It will stand in history as the
Brook Kedron over which the Southern people passed to their
Gethsemane; where every landscape was marred by ruins;
where every breath of air was a lament and every home a
house of mourning.

The magnanimity exhibited at Appomattox justifies me in
recording here my conviction that, had it been possible for
General Grant and his soldiers to foresee the bloody sweat
which through ten successive years was wrung from Southern
brows, the whole Union army would then and there have
resolved to combat all unfriendly legislation. Or, later, if Booth's
bullet had not terminated the life filled with "charity to all and
malice toward none," President Lincoln's benign purposes,
seconded by the great-hearted among our Northern countrymen,
would have saved the South from those caricatures of
government which cursed and crushed her.

In looking back now over that valley of death--the period of
reconstruction,--its waste and its woe, it is hard to realize that
the worn and impoverished Confederates were able to go
through it. The risen South of to-day is a memorial of the same
patience, endurance, and valor which immortalized the four
years' struggle for Southern independence.

All accounts agree that when the two great commanders met
in the little brick house at Appomattox, they presented a contrast
that was unique and strikingly picturesque. A stranger,
unacquainted with the situation, would have selected Lee for the
conqueror and Grant for the vanquished hero. Prompted by a
sincere respect for the illustrious Federal chieftain, General Lee
was dressed in his best uniform, and appeared at the place of
conference in faultless military attire. General

Grant, on the other hand, had received, while on his lines among
his soldiers, General Lee's reply to his last note. Without
returning to headquarters for his dress uniform, the Union
commander rode at once to the point of meeting, wearing his
fatigue suit, his cavalry boots begrimed with Virginia mud, and
his plain blue overcoat concealing all insignia of rank. I never
heard General Grant say so, but his characteristic modesty and
magnanimity, with which I became familiar in after years, lead
me to believe that consideration for General Lee prompted this
absence of ostentation.

Probably nothing I can say of these illustrious soldiers will add
to the fame of either. I am conscious of my inability to give a
clear conception of their distinguishing and dissimilar but
altogether admirable characteristics. Nevertheless, as the
follower and friend of Lee and the sincere admirer of Grant, I
desire to place on record in this concluding chapter my estimate
of both these representative Americans.

Unless it be Washington, there is no military chieftain of the
past to whom Lee can be justly likened, either in attributes of
character or in the impress for good made upon the age in which
he lived. Those who knew him best and studied him most have
agreed that he was unlike any of the great captains of history. In
his entire public career there was a singular absence of
self-seeking. Otherwise he would have listened to the wooings of
ambition when debating the course he should take at the
beginning of our sectional conflict. He knew that he could hold
any position he might wish in the armies of the Union. Not only
by General Scott, the commander-in-chief, but by his brother
officers and the civil authorities, Lee was recognized as the
foremost soldier in the United States army. He knew, for he so
declared, that the South's chances for success, except through
foreign intervention, were far from encouraging.

What would Caesar or Frederick or Napoleon have done? Deaf
to every suggestion of a duty whose only promised reward was
an approving conscience in ultimate defeat, allured by the
prospect of leading armies with overwhelming numbers and
backed by limitless resources, any one of these great captains
would have eagerly grasped the tendered power. It was not so
with Lee. Trained soldier that he was, he stood on the mountain-top
of temptation, while before his imagination there passed the
splendid pageant of conquering armies swayed by his word of
command; and he was unmoved by it. Graduated at West Point,
where he subsequently served as perhaps its most honored
superintendent; proud of his profession, near the head of which
he stood; devoted to the Union and its emblematic flag, which he
long had followed; revered by the army, to the command of
which he would have been invited--he calmly abandoned them all
to lead the forlorn hope of his people, impelled by his conviction
that their cause was just. Turning his back upon ambition, putting
selfish considerations behind him, like George Washington in the
old Revolution, he threw himself and all his interests into an
unequal struggle for separate government. When John Adams of
Massachusetts declared that, sink or swim, survive or perish, he
gave his heart and hand to the Declaration of Independence, he
stood on precisely the same moral plane on which Robert E. Lee
stood from the beginning to the end of the war. As the north star
to the sailor, so was duty to this self-denying soldier. Having
decided that in the impending and to him unwelcome conflict his
place was with his people, he did not stop to consider the cost.
He resolved to do his best; and in estimating now the relative
resources and numbers, it cannot be denied that he did more than
any leader has ever accomplished under similar conditions. And
when the end came and he realized that Appomattox was the
grave of

his people's hopes, he regretted that Providence had not
willed that his own life should end there also. He not only said in
substance, to Colonel Venable of his staff and to others, that he
would rather die than surrender the cause, but he said to me on
that fatal morning that he was sorry he had not fallen in one of
the last battles. Yet no man who saw him at Appomattox could
detect the slightest wavering in his marvellous self-poise or any
lowering of his lofty bearing. Only for a fleeting moment did he
lose complete self-control. As he rode back from the McLean
house to his bivouac, his weeping men crowded around him; and
as they assured him in broken voices of their confidence and
love, his emotions momentarily overmastered him, and his wet
cheeks told of the sorrow which his words could not express.
Throughout that crucial test at Appomattox he was the
impersonation of every manly virtue, of all that is great and true
and brave--the fittest representative of his own sublimely
beautiful adage that human virtue should always equal human
calamity.

The ancient Romans and Greeks deified after death their
heroes who possessed any one of the great virtues, all of which
were harmoniously blended in this great Southerner. It required,
however, neither his removal by death nor the hallowing
influences of distance or time to consign him to the Pantheon of
Immortals. It was more literally true of him than of any man I
ever knew, among those whom the world honors, that distance
was not needed to enhance his greatness.

A distinguished Georgian, the Hon. Benjamin H. Hill,
truthfully declared that Lee was Caesar without his crimes,
Bonaparte without his ambition, and George Washington without
his crown of success; and it is my firm conviction that when his
campaigns and his character are both understood, such will be
the verdict of Christendom.

his words, did much to alleviate the anguish inseparable from
such an ordeal. The tenor of his formal notes, the terms granted
at the appointed meeting, the prompt and cordial manner in
which he acquiesced in each and every suggestion made by the
Southern commander, left upon the minds of Confederates an
ineffaceable impression. In looking back now over the
intervening years, I am glad that I have never been tempted, in
the heat of political contests, even while the South was enduring
the agony of the carpet-baggers' rule, to utter one word of
bitterness against that great and magnanimous Union soldier.
Before the meeting at Appomattox the Confederates were
decidedly prejudiced against General Grant, chiefly because of
his refusal to exchange prisoners and thus relieve from
unspeakable suffering the thousands of incarcerated men of both
armies. On this account Southern men expected from him cold
austerity rather than soldierly sympathy. Their previous
conceptions of him, however, were totally changed when they
learned that our officers were to retain their side-arms; that both
officers and privates were to keep their horses; that their paroles
protected them from molestation on their homeward trip and in
their peaceful pursuits, so long as they obeyed the laws; and that
in the prolonged official interview there was no trace of
exultation at his triumph, but that he was in word and act the
embodiment of manly modesty and soldierly magnanimity, and
that from first to last he was evidently intent upon mitigating the
bitterness of defeat and soothing to the utmost of his ability the
lacerated sensibilities of his great antagonist.

General Grant's own declaration, made many years after the
war, that he felt "sad and depressed" as he rode to meet
General Lee in the little village of Appomattox, is entirely
consistent with every account given of his bearing at the
surrender.

by Union officers who were present, that he positively
refused to permit Union artillery to fire a salute in celebration of
the victory over his own countrymen. The exhibitions of General
Grant's magnanimity which I observed during my personal
intercourse with him immediately after the war, later while he
was President, and when he became a private citizen, are all
consistent with the spirit manifested by him at the surrender of
Lee's army. In his "Memoirs" he has given a quietus to that
widely circulated romance that he returned to Lee his proffered
sword. I do not doubt that he would have done so; but there was
no occasion for Lee's offering it, because in the terms agreed
upon it was stipulated that the Confederate officers should retain
their side-arms.

During the imprisonment and vicarious punishment of the
inflexible and stainless ex-President of the Confederacy, both
General Richard Taylor of Louisiana and I had repeated
conferences with the general-in-chief of the United States
army, in the hope of securing the release of the distinguished
prisoner. After one of the visits of the gallant Louisianian to
General Grant, Taylor told me of a conversation in reference to
the probability of General Grant's becoming President. Taylor
said that General Grant assured him, with evident sincerity, that
he had no desire to be President,--that his tastes and training
were those of a soldier and that he was
better fitted for the station he then held than for any civil office,--
but that Taylor could rest assured, if the office of President ever
came to him, he would endeavor to know no difference between
the people of the different sections. The Southern people felt
that they had cause to complain of President Grant for a lack of
sympathy during those years when imported rulers misfed
credulous negroes and piled taxes to the point of confiscation in
order to raise revenues which failed to find their way

into State treasuries; but it must be remembered that General
Grant was not a politician, and as the first civil office that came
to him was the Presidency, he was naturally influenced by those
whom he regarded as statesmen and whose long training in civil
affairs seemed peculiarly to fit them for counsellors.

General Grant was not endowed by nature with the
impressive personality and soldierly bearing of Winfield Scott
Hancock, nor with the peculiarly winning and magnetic presence
of William McKinley--few men are; but under a less attractive
exterior he combined the strong qualities of both. There can be
no doubt that Andrew Johnson, the infatuated zealot who came
to the Presidency on the ill-fated martyrdom of Abraham
Lincoln, would have followed his threat to "make treason odious"
by an order for the arrest and imprisonment of Lee and other
Confederate leaders but for the stern mandate of Grant that, in
spite of Johnson's vindictive purposes, the Southern soldier who
held a parole should be protected to the last extremity.

The strong and salutary characteristics of both Lee, and
Grant should live in history as an inspiration to coming
generations. Posterity will find nobler and more wholesome
incentives in their high attributes as men than in their brilliant
careers as warriors. The lustre of a stainless life is more lasting
than the fame of any soldier; and if General Lee's self-abnegation,
his unblemished purity, his triumph over alluring
temptations, and his unwavering consecration to all life's duties
do not lift him to the morally sublime and make him a fit ideal
for young men to follow, then no human conduct can achieve
such position.

And the repeated manifestations of General Grant's truly
great qualities--his innate modesty, his freedom from every trace
of vain-glory or ostentation, his magnanimity in victory, his
genuine sympathy for his brave

and sensitive foemen, and his inflexible resolve to protect
paroled Confederates against any assault, and vindicate, at
whatever cost, the sanctity of his pledge to the vanquished--
will give him a place in history no less renowned and more to be
envied than that secured by his triumphs as a soldier or his
honors as a civilian. The Christian invocation which came from
his dying lips, on Mount McGregor, summoning the spirit of
peace and unity and equality for all of his countrymen, made a
fitting close to the life of this illustrious American.

Scarcely less prominent in American annals than the record of
these two lives, should stand a catalogue of the thrilling incidents
which illustrate the nobler phase of soldier life so inadequately
described in these reminiscences. The unseemly things which
occurred in the great conflict between the States should be
forgotten, or at least forgiven, and no longer permitted to disturb
complete harmony between North and South. American youth in
all sections should be taught to hold in perpetual remembrance all
that was great and good on both sides; to comprehend the
inherited convictions for which saintly women suffered and
patriotic men died; to recognize the unparalleled carnage as
proof of unrivalled courage; to appreciate the singular absence
of personal animosity and the frequent manifestation between
those brave antagonists of a good-fellowship such as had never
before been witnessed between hostile armies. It will be a
glorious day for our country when all the children within its
borders shall learn that the four years of fratricidal war between
the North and the South was waged by neither with criminal or
unworthy intent, but by both to protect what they conceived to
be threatened rights and imperilled liberty; that the issues which
divided the sections were born when the Republic was born, and
were forever buried in an ocean of fraternal blood. We shall
then see that,

under God's providence, every sheet of flame from the blazing
rifles of the contending armies, every whizzing shell that tore
through the forests at Shiloh and Chancellorsville, every cannon-shot
that shook Chickamauga's hills or thundered around the
heights of Gettysburg, and all the blood and the tears that were
shed are yet to become contributions for the upbuilding of
American manhood and for the future defence of American
freedom. The Christian Church received its baptism of
pentecostal power as it emerged from the shadows of Calvary,
and went forth to its world-wide work with greater unity and a
diviner purpose. So the Republic, rising from its baptism of blood
with a national life more robust, a national union more complete,
and a national influence ever widening, shall go forever
forward in its benign mission to humanity.

Chickamauga, 198; compared with other great battles,
199; first day's battle, 201-204; night after the battle,
204, 205; second day's battle, 205-212; victory
claimed by both sides, 210; comparative strength of
the armies, 210